PHILADELPHIA -- The Penguins were, they insisted, "champing at the bit" to get the 2020-21 season started.
No reason to doubt that. Teams tend to be pretty excited -- and optimistic -- when they get a fresh start, and there's nothing like a whole new season to provide that.
So, yeah, the Penguins were champing at the bit heading into what became a 6-3 loss to Philadelphia at Wells Fargo Center Wednesday evening. And they seemed to keep it up for much of the evening. At least until they stopped champing and simply spit the bit during the final 15 minutes the third period, when the Flyers put the game away with three unanswered goals.
Oh, the Penguins had made some ghastly mistakes before that -- like allowing James van Riemsdyk to prevent Tristan Jarry from getting a glimpse of the puck on either of Philadelphia's first two goals -- but they had done some things pretty well, too.
They'd had an advantage in play at even-strength.
The unit of Jared McCann, Mark Jankowski and Brandon Tanev was giving them the best performance they'd gotten from a third line in a long time.
And Jarry was stopping pretty much everything he saw (although he never got so much as a glimpse of the first two pucks that got past him).
So when Tanev took a cross-ice feed from Jankowski and threw a shot past Flyers goalie Carter Hart from near the left dot at 3:01 of the third period to tie the game, 3-3, the Penguins had every reason to believe they could take a point -- maybe two -- out of the opener:
And then the bit went flying.
Which is more than Jake Guentzel could be accused of doing while backchecking on what proved to be the game-winning goal, as Guentzel couldn't catch up with Michael Raffl before he buried a Scott Laughton setup behind Jarry at 5:37:
The knockout blows came a few minutes later, when Travis Konecny flipped a backhander by Jarry during a scramble in front of the net at 12:14, just 20 seconds before Kevin Hayes rapped in a rebound to give the Flyers their margin of victory.
"The couple of quick ones kind of put them on their heels," Konecny said. "That was nice."
Perhaps the most striking thing about Philadelphia's final two goals was that Mike Matheson, making his Penguins debut, wasn't involved in either of them.
He had, after all, been on the ice for three of Philadelphia's first four goals, and was in the penalty box for the other.
On the first, Matheson was unable to prevent van Riemsdyk from setting up in front of Jarry and tipping an Erik Gustafsson shot past him. He had served about eight seconds of a cross-checking minor when Nolan Patrick gave the Flyers a 2-1 lead, and seemed to lose track of Joel Farabee in the Penguins' zone shortly before Farabee slid a shot past Jarry and inside the left post for the third Flyers goal.
A Matheson giveaway in the attacking zone triggered the sequence that culminated in Raffl's goal.
Matheson's work in training camp apparently had convinced the coaching staff to give him an audition alongside John Marino on the No. 2 pairing. His play in the opener, though, gave Mike Sullivan little reason to deploy him there against when the Penguins and Flyers meet again Friday night.
And while Matheson demonstrated that he's a good skater with considerable offensive ability, it's not a reach to wonder whether he, trying to regain confidence after a couple of miserable seasons in Florida, will suffer any lingering effects from such a disappointing defensive performance in his first game with a new team.
Sullivan suggested that Matheson "didn't have the benefit of any puck luck" in the opener, but also acknowledged that he remains a work in progress.
"Mike's trying to get use to the type of game that we play," he said. "We're going to work with him here, through this beginning part of the season, to try to help him simplify his game. ... This game is not an easy game. It's not for the faint of heart. You've got to make sure dust yourself off and get back in the fight."
Sullivan might want to forward a copy of that message to his penalty-killers, too.
That unit is expected to be one of the Penguins' strengths, but allowed two goals in three shorthanded situations in the opener.
"We know we can be better," Jankowski said. "That group we have there, we take a lot of pride in it. ... We didn't get the job done tonight."
True enough, but the Penguins did see a few things, like the play of Jankowski's line, to give them reason for hope as the season moves along.
That unit not only scored twice, but played well defensively, which is its primary mandate.
Its members skate well, and seem to have a good sense of where the others are, and where they're going.
"For the most part, I thought our line was good tonight," Jankowski said. "I think we were hard on pucks on the forecheck, didn't give them too much in the (defensive) zone. We just have to build on that."
Likewise, their team has to use the things it did well while the outcome was in doubt as a foundation on which to construct a successful season.
The obvious breakdowns and letdowns aside, there were some positives, such as their 30-19 edge in shots when playing five-on-five, on which the Penguins can draw.
"I thought there was a lot to like about our game," Sullivan said.
Of course, there was even more about which he and his staff likely are concerned.
Jankowski, though, made the point that the coaches need not fret about how their players will respond to the adversity -- self-induced and otherwise -- they endured in the opener.
"I haven't been here too long," he said. "But I can already tell there's no quit in this group."
• Sidney Crosby scored an early goal-of-the-year candidate as a lackluster power play was winding down in the second period. Hart tried to clear the puck from behind the goal line, only to have Crosby knock it out of the air, then flip the puck over Hart's stick and into the net with just one hand on his stick.
• Evan Rodrigues, who has been a placeholder at right wing on the No. 1 line since Kasperi Kapanen's arrival from Finland by delayed by Immigration issues, had three shots on goal, but did nothing to suggest that he's a threat to hold onto that role with Crosby and Guentzel when Kapanen is ready to join the lineup.
• Several Flyers goals could be traced back to faceoff wins, something of which Philadelphia had plenty. The Flyers had a 29-21 edge on draws, and Crosby (10-8) was the only Penguins forward to have a winning record while handling more than one. In fact, he was the only Penguins player to control more than one faceoff through the first 40 minutes of play. Philadelphia is an excellent faceoff team, but that's another area of the game in which the Penguins will have to improve.
• Some things in Philadelphia never will change. The "Check of the Game," as announced via the arena scoreboard, was a hit Jakub Voracek delivered to McCann in the neutral zone that resulted in Voracek getting an interference minor.
• Flyers defenseman Erik Gustafsson, whose point shots set up the first two Philadelphia goals, said the absence of fans "makes it easier to make plays" because teammates are able to communicate better.