Blue Jackets have made memorable NHL debuts throughout team history

So far, 114 players have made their NHL debuts in a Blue Jackets sweater, but very few have been anticipated quite as much as one (or two) that could happen Wednesday.
The Blue Jackets took forward Kent Johnson fifth overall in the 2021 NHL Draft, and the highly skilled University of Michigan product very well could play his first game tomorrow night against Montreal in Nationwide Arena.

And he could be joined by his teammate and friend Nick Blankenburg, a U-M defenseman who also signed with the Blue Jackets on Friday and should get a look at some point down the stretch by Columbus brass.
It all leads to a generally obvious question -- what can be expected in an NHL debut, especially from a player as highly touted as Johnson?
Well, let's start here -- just six of the 101 skaters (the other 13 are goalies) to make their NHL debut in a CBJ sweater have scored in that first game. That's hard to believe, but it also goes to show just how difficult it can be to make an impact in your first game at the sport's highest level.
If there's good news from Johnson's perspective, it's that four of those six were first-round draft picks of the Blue Jackets. Rick Nash was the first when he debuted in 2002, and he was joined among first-round picks by Jakub Voracek in 2008, Nikita Filatov that same year, and Pierre-Luc Dubois in 2017. The others? David Vyborny, a European veteran who scored in the first CBJ game back in 2000, as well as Trey Fix-Wolansky, who tallied a key goal in the third period of his debut back on Feb. 8 in Washington.

Johnson, meanwhile, is 19 years old and won't hit 20 until Oct. 18 of this year. That means he will become the 16th teenager to make his NHL debut as a Blue Jacket if he plays down the stretch; should he do so Wednesday at 18 years, 177 days, he'll become the 12th youngest player ever to put on a union blue sweater.
He has company this year, though, and in fact he still isn't the youngest player on the roster. Despite the fact he's played through an entire season at this point, fellow 2021 first-round pick Cole Sillinger remains just 18 years old, with birthday No. 19 not on the docket until May.
Sillinger made a little bit of history this year when he became the first CBJ first-round pick to join the team the year after he was drafted since Filatov debuted in October 2008, and Johnson would follow in his footsteps there. It used to be a little more commonplace, as Sillinger became the sixth first-round pick in team history to join the team the season after his draft when he joined Filatov, Gilbert Brule (2005-06), Nik Zherdev (2003-04), Nash (2002-03) and Rostislav Klesla (2000-01).
Should either Johnson or Blankenburg want to make more history, no CBJ player has ever scored twice in an NHL debut, and only three players have posted multipoint games. None has ever topped two points, as Tomas Kubalik (March 2011) and Grant Clitsome (March 2010) each had two assists, while Voracek went 1-1-2 in his first game.
Also, the Blue Jackets appear on pace to match team history if both Johnson and Blankenburg get in the lineup. So far, eight players -- forwards Sillinger, Yegor Chinakhov, Gregory Hofmann, Justin Danforth, Fix-Wolansky and Carson Meyer as well as defenseman Jake Christiansen and goalie Daniil Tarasov -- have made their NHL debuts for the Jackets this season, a mark that ties for fifth in team history with 2007-08.
Three times, nine players have debuted in CBJ colors -- 2019-20, 2011-12 and 2003-04 -- but the team record of 10 would be matched if both Johnson and Blankenburg see the ice. That record was set in the team's inaugural season of 2000-01, when Vyborny, Klesla, Bill Bowler, Mathieu Darche, Matt Davidson, Chris Nielsen, Petteri Nummelin, Sean Selmser, Jody Shelley and Martin Spanhel all played in their first NHL games.

Some Memorable Debuts

Rick Nash: The No. 1 overall pick in the 2002 draft -- the only top pick in team history -- wasted little time making an impact, as he was in the lineup at age 18 come that fall. And he delighted Nationwide Arena on Oct. 10, 2002, when he scored the first goal of the season in a CBJ victory as he put home the rebound of a Mike Sillinger shot.
"It was kind of like a storybook,"
Nash previously told BlueJackets.com
. "It was an exciting night that honestly I will never forget. I still remember the puck going between the goalie's legs and then it disappearing, so I knew he either had it or it was in the net.
"The old saying, they don't ask how, they ask how many. That was one of those ones that wasn't the prettiest. You either swatted it in or it was under his pad. It took about a half second to hear the horn and the fans going crazy. It just kind of put a stamp on playing your first NHL game and that feeling of what it's like to score in the NHL."
Jake Voracek: He's now in his second tour of duty with the Blue Jackets and recently played in his 1,000th NHL game, but the oldest player on the current roster was just 19 when he had a goal and an assist Oct. 10, 2008, at Dallas.
Voracek went back to juniors for a year after being drafted, then made the team a year later and impressed. Looking back earlier this year on the occasion of his 1,000th game, the Czech winger still remembers the feeling of notching his first NHL tally in his first game.
"It's pretty interesting," Voracek

. "It's a great story to tell. The first couple of shifts, you're skating around, you're backchecking, you're forechecking, you're looking around kind of thinking, 'Wow, I'm in the NHL. This is the NHL. I made it. This is unreal.' Then you see Mike Modano flying around with his jersey flapping behind him. It was really cool to see.
"Obviously, I was lucky enough to score on my first shot in my first game. The interesting part is nobody knew it was in because I hit the back bar of the net and it came out so quickly that we didn't even know it was in.
"As soon as we got to the bench, obviously, the coaches started talking about if it possibly went in. Derick Brassard told me, 'I think it's in, Jake.' So I started thinking about, 'Did I just score a goal in the NHL?' You don't want to believe that. So they reviewed it, and the goal was good. I was like Alice in Wonderland, looking around like, 'What happened?' you know?"
Pierre-Luc Dubois: A lot of eyes were on the No. 3 overall pick in the 2016 draft when he debuted a year later in the season opener Oct. 6, 2017, against the New York Islanders.
He had been a shock pick at that spot by the Blue Jackets, who went out on a limb to draft the big, skilled center from the QMJHL. And Dubois didn't disappoint, scoring his first NHL goal late in the game in what was a 5-0 blowout for the Jackets. He tallied after Seth Jones created a turnover to feed Dubois into the offensive zone.
"It's crazy,"
Dubois said looking back
. "First of all, it's a dream come true. Playing your first game, just warming up and realizing after warmups, 'I'm actually going to play in my first game.' Then Sonny (MIlano) scores the first goal, that was his first NHL goal, then we score three more after so we were leading 4-0.
"I think maybe one or two shifts before my goal, I had a 2-on-1 with (Brandon) Dubinsky and I shot it and the goalie stopped it, and I was like, there was my chance to score. There it was. I was telling myself that wasn't the only chance I'd get during the game, but that was a golden chance I just missed.
"Then maybe one or two shifts later, Jonesy made a nice play to keep the puck in. It just bounced to me. I shot it and then I didn't know it went in right away. Then I saw the ref do the motion of the goal and I kind of just blacked out."