The Carolina Hurricanes are scheduled to play six preseason games, but Rod Brind'Amour wasted no time throwing his veterans in to action.
The Canes' top three lines were rolling which helped deliver a 5-1 win over Tampa Bay at PNC Arena.
Other WRAL Top Stories
"I thought it was good, we played hard," said Brind'Amour. "It's probably how it should look, considering how the line-ups were kinda based."
It was all about knocking off the rust and that went for goaltender Frederik Andersen, too, who played a full 60 minutes in the win. The Canes ace netminder hadn't seen action since suffering a lower-body injury back in April. Andersen made 20 saves in the win.
"You talk about rust factor, that's probably a lot of rust there," said Brind'Amour. "It's a confidence builder."
Sprinkled in to the lineup was a handful of newcomers, and they all contributed. Both Paul Stastny and Malte Stromewall scored power-play goals, while former Vegas Golden Knight defenseman Dylan Coghlan had three assists all coming on the man-advantage.
"When i got traded I knew I was going to have an opportunity to play on the power play," said Coghlan. "It's something I take pride in."
Andrei Svechnikov got the scoring going in the second period on a blistering one-timer from the left circle. He finished the night with a goal and an assist.
"Svech had a really good little step going tonight," said Brind'Amour. "He probably could have had a couple more goals."
For Brind'Amour, the mix of veterans and newcomers was all about making sure there's chemistry developing and that the new people are doing it the right way. "Our game" as we always hear.
Stastny, who had the game's second power-play goal, is both a veteran and newcomer. The 36-year-old signed as a free agent in August and looks to be the perfect fit to slide in to replace Nino Niederreiter (signed with Nashville) on the third line with Jordan Staal and Jesper Fast.
“He knows how to play,” said Brind'Amour. “Whatever situation you want to put him in, he gets it, he’s been there. There’s a lot of comfort in that.”
"A couple steps we were off, but we're talking out there and we're finding each other out," said Stastny. "The good thing we are communicating and I think the more you play like that the easier it gets."
While there was definitely a buzz in some steps tonight and the power play looked encouraging, Brind'Amour was quick to tame any excitement. Roddy reiterated that's how it should have looked given Tampa's lineup, but it's a start and he liked what he saw.
"We all want to, at the end of this preseason, make sure we're all on the same page and moving forward. said Brind'Amour. "So I guess today was a good first step."