Connor McDavid: McDavid shows potential in scoreless debut

Our Blues won their season opener at home against the Edmonton Oilers. It was a gaggle of media reserved only for the Cardinals in St. Louis, with Blues players joking “Oh, it must be Connor McDavid night”.

It was his first National Hockey League goal, and it turned out to be a game-winner at Scottrade Center. That’s not to suggest that McDavid’s Edmonton Oilers (3-1 losers to the St. Louis Blues) or Eichel’s Buffalo Sabres (3-1 losers to the Ottawa Senators) will be as bad as those Penguins, but they might be.

“I came off the bench and saw the play there and I wasn’t sure if he saw or heard me”, Fabbri said.

McLellan had McDavid on the ice in the final minute of the third period of a one-goal game. Goalie Brian Elliott stopped 23 of 24 shots to get the win in goal.

“We know what kind of player he is, and we know what he’s going to bring to the table for our team”, Oilers centre Ryan Nugent-Hopkins said after the game.

“You listen to everything and it’s ‘Where a team is going to finish, who’s going to have success, who’s going to fail, who’s going to get fired, who’s going to be on the block as far as a player, who’s under pressure?’ But when you start playing, it’s about the season in front of us and it’s a great feeling”. While you’re waiting, say hi to our friends at The Copper & Blue, who are looking forward to the promise of a new year as much as we are, only with probably a little less cynicism.

McDavid, the No. 1 overall pick in this year’s draft, took 22 shifts, played 18:07 and was on the ice for Brouwer’s goal. Fans of both teams have waited long enough to see these two rivals face off under a big sky. “Check. Check.” Hitchcock’s chat was “90 per cent” about the Oilers’ scheme under McLellan, which is similar to his approach from San Jose, and very little about McDavid. “So it’s a matter of time and chemistry, and trying to find the right combinations for him and his linemates”.

Fabbri was the Blues’ first-round pick in the 2014 draft and McDavid was the No. 1 overall selection by the Oilers last summer.

St. Louis Blues’ Alex Pietrangelo, top right, flips over Edmonton… It does not make him a better player or better candidate for the Calder Trophy than the Erie Otter alumnus and conductor of the biggest hype train since Sidney Crosby came in the league-Connor McDavid.

“Last night, I had no problem sleeping”. Nugent-Hopkins was credited with the unassisted power-play goal with 2:38 remaining in the period.

I had never seen McDavid play live before Thursday, and I realized that morning that I had the same mixture of intrigue and expectation I used to have three decades ago when I headed off to see Gretzky or Lemieux. “Usually it hits a guy and it pops up in the air”. “I had a couple chances that I need to score on”. They now go on a massive road trip that won’t see them return to St. Louis until 2020. “When’s he going to score?”

Pietrangelo also has been impressed by Fabbri, who can play up to nine games for the Blues before they have to make a decision to keep him on the roster for the season or send him back to his junior team in Canada. He scored twice against Detroit on January 19, 2013.

RW Robby Fabbri made his National Hockey League debut on Thursday night against the Oilers.