"I think it was a good fight. I'm happy for him," Mrazek smiled. "He did well."
Perhaps not smiling was his head coach.
"That was surprising," Brind'Amour said. "I don't like seeing that, to be quite honest, but I like that he stepped up for his teammate."
It was just the second fight in Hamilton's 553-game NHL career, his last one coming nearly six years ago against Gabriel Landeskog on Jan. 21, 2015.
Finding a Way
The Canes played just 36 games in the 2020 calendar year, so forgive the fact that the first game of 2021 was sloppy and scrambly at times. That's to be expected and is something that may seep into games around the league for the first week or so of the season.
The good news? The Canes still got the win. They out-shot the Red Wings by an incredible 43-14 margin. They scored a power-play goal. Their defense locked it down when they needed to. And, when called upon, Mrazek was unbreakable.
"It proves a lot for our team," Niederreiter said. "We all know as a group we have a lot better, and we know what we have to do to be better. It's the first game of the season, so it was a good win."
"You're always going to be nitpicking, but that's definitely not how it should look," Brind'Amour said. "Game one after a long layoff, I'm not too upset about it. The effort was really good, and that's the key."
