Flames end season-opening drought with win over Avalanche

CALGARY — The Calgary Flames won their season opener for the first time in well over a decade with a 5-3 victory over the defending Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche on Thursday.

The Flames halted the NHL's longest active winless streak in openers — 0-10-2 after their last win in 2009 — by scoring twice in the second and third periods.

"I saw a random stat that it's been awhile since the Flames won a season opener, so I'm happy we can get that off our backs and we can just carry on another 81 games here," new Flames defenceman MacKenzie Weegar said.

Dillon Dube scored short-handed and defenceman Rasmus Andersson scored on a breakaway coming out of the penalty box in the middle period. Elias Lindholm and Tyler Toffoli contributed power-play goals in the third and Brett Ritchie also scored for Calgary.

Weegar joined Calgary's other off-season acquisitions Jonathan Huberdeau, Nazem Kadri and Kevin Rooney in their regular-season debuts for the Flames.

Weegar had two assists. Kadri assisted on Calgary's fourth goal and Huberdeau the fifth.

Calgary's Jacob Markstrom, a Vézina Trophy finalist last season, made 22 saves for the win, which was also the 700th of head coach Darryl Sutter's career.

Defenceman Bowen Byram, Nathan MacKinnon and Valeri Nichushkin scored for Colorado. Pavel Francouz stopped 22 shots in the loss.

The Avalanche had travelled overnight to play their second game in as many days. They raised the Stanley Cup banner and beat the Chicago Blackhawks 5-2 at Ball Arena on Wednesday.

"For sure the energy level wasn't where it needed to be," Colorado head coach Jared Bednar said. "It wasn't where it was last night. Give Calgary credit. I thought they did what they needed to do to make it tough on us."

Kadri