SvoNotes: Sillinger's first goal one to remember in CBJ victory

It was the moment Cole Sillinger has waited his entire life for.
But in fairness, that's not really all that long.
The youngest player in the NHL and the fourth-youngest in Blue Jackets history scored his first career goal last night, a key marker in a 3-2 overtime win for Columbus, and to hear him tell it -- well, he wasn't really all that excited.

"To be honest with you, I'm pretty relaxed about it," Sillinger said when asked postgame if the adrenaline was still flowing about the milestone accomplishment. "I think it was just good for all of us to rebound and get a key win here in our home building. The work starts tomorrow again for preparation on Saturday now. Pretty cool feeling to get my first one, but just have to put this one past us and go on to the next one."
That answer was Sillinger to a T, as he's been lauded by teammates and coaches alike for being mature beyond his years since being chosen 12th overall in the NHL draft in July. And yet, if you watch Sillinger in the moments after he scored, his celebration would show that it was, in fact, a pretty big deal.

Even Sillinger admits, "As soon as it went in, I blacked out," so yeah, there was some excitement in the moment he took a pass from Vladislav Gavrikov at the front of the net and quickly drove it past Islanders goalie Ilya Sorokin to give Columbus a 2-1 lead.
"I think that I was getting chances in games, so that was my main focus," he said. "I knew it was going to come some time. I just tried to generate for my team as much as I can, and it was really good that one finally popped in the net there. Hopefully more to come."
There doesn't seem to be any doubt that will be the case. Sillinger was lauded before the draft for his scoring ability -- including an excellent shot and great hockey sense that allowed him to notch 24 goals in 31 USHL games a year ago -- and showed some pretty good touch at the Traverse City Prospects Tournament before training camp in September.
But there was obviously a jump going from playing college players, draft picks and AHLers in upstate Michigan to the NHL level, as Sillinger went without a goal in the preseason and in his first three NHL games. In fact, he played only sparingly in the third period of Tuesday's loss at Detroit, as not only was he struggling a bit, head coach Brad Larsen switched up the lines and had a tough time finding spots to insert him in the game.

It led to some questions of where this whole thing was going with Sillinger -- again, he's the youngest guy in the league, and it's traditionally tough sledding in this league for 18-year-olds -- but coach and player met before Thursday's game and Sillinger came out energized Thursday. He finished with a team-high six shots on goal in a career-high 17:17 of action and the team had a 76.55 expected goals share when he was on the ice at 5-on-5.
"I think the thing about Cole is, you saw the last game, right?" Larsen said. "You don't know how an 18-year-old kid is going to respond, especially against the team we were playing tonight. We had a good discussion about it. Again, he just shows his maturity, right? I don't know if you caught it, but the last matchup I had in the third period was him vs. (Isles star Mat) Barzal, and he took it head on.
"He's still got a lot to learn, but I love his game. I just love the response, how he played, how he was assertive. He wasn't scared -- didn't play scared one bit tonight."
After the game, Sillinger was awarded the Kepi hat in the locker room as the team's player of the game, and you could see the genuine joy from his teammates to see the youngster notch NHL goal No. 1.
"It's awesome," Patrik Laine said. "I've been there, too, when I scored my first NHL goal and it definitely feels good, so hopefully he's gonna get a bunch more. He's played really well the first four games. I'm just excited to see what the future holds for Cole."

Time for Overtime

It certainly helps to have one of the best scorers in the game on the ice in 3-on-3 overtime. It's a lesson the Blue Jackets learned well when they had Artemi Panarin.
The Russian dynamo was particularly good in overtime because of his creativity and ability to both protect and make plays with the puck, as Columbus went 17-6 in 3-on-3 the two years Panarin wore union blue.
Since then, it's been a 180 for the Jackets, as overtime was often a time for fans to make an early run for the exits. Over the past two seasons without Panarin, Columbus was 11-20 in overtime, with a 3-7 record in the shootout added on for good measure (that's 27 loser points over 126 games, a truly stunning number).
But so far this year, the Jackets are 2-0, and both winners have come off the stick of Laine. He's certainly a different player than Panarin, but when you have someone who can score from anywhere and you give him a little extra ice, it's fair to say good things can happen.

"I think just getting a little bit more chances, you're obviously learning as you go," Laine said about the extra frame. "But it's not like it's the first time I've played overtime. It's not my first time, but yeah, obviously there is more room and there is more time for little plays that you can make out there. Hopefully I'm going to get a couple more."
Both overtime winners for Laine have come from nearly the same spot, the right circle, but this one was much different than the winner from the Seattle game on Saturday. In this one, moments before the goal, Laine had a look at a shot from the high slot but passed it up to try to tee up Zach Werenski, who fanned on the bouncing puck.
Laine got the puck back, though, from Werenski at the left point and considered his options. He said he considered taking the puck back to the neutral zone as Werenski went for a change, but instead he sensed the Islanders had a tired group on the ice and chose to attack. He went along the blue line, faked a pass to the overlapping Jake Bean, beat Anders Lee to the circle and unleashed a wrister far side -- low blocker -- past Sorokin while flying through the air.
While Laine made the split-second decision to attack the net on the goal, he already had in his mind where he was going to shoot the puck. While his winner against Seattle went short side, past the glove, this one went to the far post thanks to a tip from CBJ goalie coach Manny Legace.
"Our goalie coach told me to go low blocker, so that's where I went and it went in," Laine said. "I didn't even have to look at the net, I knew where I was going to try to shoot it. Apparently that was his weakness, like (Legace) told me, and it seems to be working."
Laine is now just the fifth player in NHL history with two overtime goals in his team's first four games. The last? Mike Santorelli with Vancouver in 2013. Former CBJ defenseman Jack Johnson also did it for Los Angeles in 2011.

More Power

Another area that's certainly been a bugaboo for Blue Jackets fans over the years is the power play. We don't really have to rehash that one too much -- CBJ fans know it, with the team placing 25th or worse in the NHL in power-play percentage the past four seasons -- but things have been a bit different so far this year.
After a second straight 1-for-4 showing, Columbus is now 4 for 11 on the season, a success rate of 36.4 percent that is tied for fifth in the league in the early going.
I
talked a bit earlier this week
about the "total football" aspect the power play sometimes has, where anybody can play any position depending on how the play unfolds, and the Blue Jackets took advantage of that with Boone Jenner's opening goal of the game.
The way the Jackets broke the puck into the zone, things settled with Jakub Voracek at the top of the zone and Zach Werenski along the right half wall. Those two are usually in opposite spots, but rather than try to get into their normal power play alignment, Werenski and Voracek just went with it.

It resulted in Voracek taking a pass from Werenski and firing a wrister from the top of the slot that went off the sticks of both Oliver Bjorkstrand and then Jenner before deflecting past the shoulder of Sorokin. The goal not only tied the score at 1, it gave the Blue Jackets a big lift late in the second period, with Sillinger scoring on the next shift.
"It happened on the fly," Voracek said. "Sometimes it happens on a break-in that it's gonna end up like that, and I find it better that the guys just stay in that position instead of switching because it creates a lot of confusion if we start switching. I played that (spot) in juniors, so I know how to play it.
"1 for 4, it got us going. That's what you want from the power play. We work on it a lot, we talk about it a lot, and we have to get better at that as well."

Stats and Facts

• Bjorkstrand finished with three assists and Voracek had one, moving them each to 99 in their CBJ careers. Seems fair to say the milestone 100th is coming soon for each. (Voracek, remember, had 427 over 10 years in Philadelphia, as well.)
• At 18 years, 158 days, Sillinger also is the fourth youngest goal in team history behind Rick Nash (18-116), Dan Fritsche (18-130) and Nikita Filatov (18-145).
• While we continue to drive home the youth angle for Sillinger, how about this -- the youngest player in the league matched up against the oldest, 43-year-old New York defenseman Zdeno Chara. It's too bad the injured Nathan Gerbe wasn't playing, as you also could have matched up the shortest and tallest players in the league as well.
• With Sillinger's goal, 10 different players have goals for Columbus through four games.
• Happy homecomings, as the Blue Jackets are 3-0-0 at Nationwide Arena to start a season for just the third time in franchise history, the last time being 2009.
• Jenner, who scored his team-best third goal of the year, was at 25:07 of ice time in the loss at Detroit but down to 21:45 in this one. He also went 16-7 in the faceoff circle. Fair to say it was a Boones day.
• Elvis Merzlikins was again very good in his third start of the year, finishing with 34 saves on 36 shots against. His save percentage is at .947, while he and Joonas Korpisalo combined are at .949. That's good netminding.
• Laine (2-3-5) has a point in every game this year, while Oliver Bjorkstrand's 2-5-7 line in four games leads the team and is tied for sixth in the NHL. Is this the year everyone in the league learns The Maestro's name?
• Rookie winger Yegor Chinakhov had four shots on goal in 10:03, including a couple of howitzers on the power play. The 20-year-old isn't shy when it comes to shooting, and he shouldn't be.
• Columbus is 6-1-1 in the last eight vs. New York in Nationwide Arena.