KA-BOOM!

Talk about living up to his billing.
Nazem Kadri scored a pair of goals in the first period and added an assist as the Flames improved to 5-1 on the season with a 4-1 victory over the Penguins Tuesday night at the Scotiabank Saddledome.
The prized off-season free-agent acquisition now has four goals and nine points in six games, collecting at least a point in each of the club's half-dozen tilts to start the campaign.

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Only two players in Flames history have posted a longer season-opening streak from the start of their tenure with the franchise: Phil Housley (7 GP in 1994-95) and Sergei Makarov (7 GP in 1989-90).
Jonathan Huberdeau tallied his first in Flames silks, while veteran blueliner Michael Stone continued to have a hot hand, rounding out the scoring for the homeside.
Stone has an impressive two goals and five points in six outings.
Jacob Markstrom was excellent between the pipes making 32 saves, 18 saves of them coming in the second period.
He made some massive stops at key points of the night, including robbing Evgeni Malkin late in the first period, kicking out his left pad to deny Sam Poulin who was all alone at the side of the net in the second, and denying Bryan Rust's Grade-Aer on a Pens powerplay.
The FlameS absolutely dominated the opening frame, but with nearly three-quarters of the first 20 gone and up 14-1 in the shot count with a handful of Grade-A chances already, they finally beat Casey DeSmith.
And it was a beauty.
After a solid cycle in the Pens zone, Kadri finished off a dandy no-look backhand pass from Andrew Mangiapane who was behind the net at 5:49, putting the puck top shelf over DeSmith's blocker from in tight. Their linemate, Dillon Dube, picked up the other helper.

Kadri made it 2-0 on the Flames 20th shot of the night at 17:42, skating down the left wing and snapping a perfectly placed wrister farside just under the bar. He created a turnover to start the play by getting his stick on a pass attempt just inside the Flames blueline, then gathering the puck and galloping down the ice.

The Flames went to the powerplay 2:55 into the second and exactly five seconds later, Huberdeau scored with a wrister from above the left faceoff circle that beat DeSmith high blocker side. Kadri got an assist, as did Rasmus Andersson.

Pittsburgh tied it up on a powerplay of their own at 4:32, Markstrom making the first stop on Jeff Carter but Malkin sweeping the rebound home.
Stone restored the three-goal cushion at 11:20 after a hard-working shift by Kevin Rooney, Brett Ritchie and Milan Lucic. Lucic set up the tally when he banked a pass off the boards up to Stone who stepped into a one-time howitzer from near the blueline that beat a screened DeSmith.

The script flipped in the period with the Pens having a big edge in shots at 20-4, but the homeside batting 50% to lead 4-1.
Oh, here's a look at that Markstrom save on Rust.

THEY SAID IT:

BY THE NUMBERS:

Shots: CGY 35, PIT 33
Powerplay:CGY 1-3, PIT 1-5
Hits:CGY 17, PIT 18
Face-offs: CGY 64%, PIT 36%
\Scoring chances: CGY 21, PIT 25
\High-danger scoring chances:CGY 12, PIT 11
\According of Natural Stat Trick (5-on-5)*

THE LINEUP:

The trios and D pairs to start the tilt:
Forwards
Jonathan Huberdeau - Elias Lindholm - Tyler Toffoli
Dillon Dube - Mikael Backlund - Andrew Mangiapane
Blake Coleman - Mikael Backlund - Trevor Lewis
Milan Lucic - Kevin Rooney - Brett Ritchie
Pairings
MacKenzie Weegar - Christopher Tanev
Noah Hanifin - Rasmus Andersson
Nikita Zadorov - Michael Stone
Goaltender
Jacob Markstrom- starter
Dan Vladar

UP NEXT:

The Flames will host the Oilers for Round 2 of the Battle of Alberta on Saturday.
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