Ladies and gentlemen, we had hockey today. It came in the form of two exciting games, with the Slovakians pulling a massive upset over Finland and the Swedes pulling away from an upstart Italian club. Overall, it was a good lil' appetizer to the men's Olympic season, giving fans exactly what they wanted: intriguing hockey.
Believe it or not, one of those teams had a Vegas Golden Knights star playing. That would be the Swedes, who had Rasmus Andersson anchoring the blue line. The good news was that it was at a time when Golden Knights fans weren't sleeping and were actually awake.
You can't say the same for when Akira Schmid and the Swiss team play. So you'd better get your cups of coffee, pasta and muffins ready, dear reader. It'll be a long day of Olympic watching with the Golden Knights.
But let's look at Andersson for a second and see how he did. After all, he's the Golden Knight that kicked off the festivities. How did he do in the opening "night" of the men's Olympic hockey tenure? Heck, let's give him a grade while we're at it!
Rasmus Andersson generated two shots on goal for Team Sweden
It took Team Sweden a little bit to get going against Italy. In fact, the Italians scored the game's first goal on a botched misplay from Filip Gustavsson that led to Luca Frigo scoring. However, the Swedes burst for five goals and blew out Italy.
As for Andersson, he only had two shots on goal throughout the game. He was part of an aggressive blue line that attacked Italy's goaltending throughout the game, eventually breaking through for a pull-away victory. While the newest Golden Knights star was one of the quieter players, he still had a decent impact.
So what grade should the defenseman get for his first game? Well, he might've been somewhat transparent during the blowout win. However, he was still impactful on the offensive end.
Sweden wasn't 100% to start the game and that included Andersson. You can chalk that up to Damian Clara being strong in net, stopping 46 of 49 shots. Still, the Swedes got the win and they put themselves in a strong position for the next round.
That was the case with Andersson, who eventually picked up the slack and started driving plays. With that, his team won the game. Still, there's plenty of work to be done, both for Sweden and the Golden Knights defenseman. That's especially true with Finland about to come out angry after an embarrassing loss and a surprising Slovakia team. All parties had better fine-tune some things before a raging Finnish fist comes their way.