If you didn't get a chance to head down to Crescent Point Place on Friday night, you missed a fantastic hockey game. The Red Wings opened their season with a 6–4 win over the Yorkton Terriers and showed a lot of character in the come-from-behind win. 

As I watched my fifth Red Wings game this year, albeit the first one with a regular season lineup, I have some takeaways from this team's debut.

1) Riley Lamb is the real deal.  

A slow start to the game should have done the Red Wings in. At one point in the first period, they were being outshot 13–2 and had to kill off a 5-on-3 for almost a full two minutes. Enter the 20-year-old netminder. Lamb faced 48 shots in the game and although four got past him, two were deflections in front and one was a partial breakaway.

The Terriers had numerous great chances outside of their extended powerplay including a couple Jared Legien breakaways in the early going. The former WHL goalie got the better of the former WHL forward throughout the game. If it hadn't been for Lamb in goal, the game might have ended much differently for Weyburn. 

"We should have probably been down 5–1 in the first period. He's a veteran goalie and he's proven that he can play, at whatever level, as a great goalie," Head Coach Wes Rudy said after the game. "Him being back there calmed the guys down and it took us 30 minutes to really get into the game tonight." 

If Lamb plays as he did on Friday night, he'll be a pillar of the Red Wings success this season.

2) They'll have no problem scoring goals.

The top line of Ben Hiltz, Jordan Kazymyra and Cade Kowalski combined for 11 points and all six goals on the night. Aside from their slow start, Rudy leaned on them down the stretch to generate consistent offence. Both Hiltz and Kazymyra have lethal shots and Kowalski is a great set up guy with his vision of the game.

The second line of Connor Pyne, Ty Brown and Sean Olson should also be dangerous once they take some time to gel. All are big bodies and work hard down low, with a solid set of skills that should be a nightmare for teams. Although two members of the third line were ejected, Burke Johnstone and Will Cruise have veteran qualities and Rhett Frey is a good complement to a sound third line.

The young fourth line of Bryce Krauter, Quade Froese and Khale Skinner showed flashes of greatness as they worked hard on the forecheck all night.  They even had a terrific shift later in the second period that seemed to shift momentum and directly led to a goal.

3) They still have a long way to go.

As Coach Rudy so eloquently put it, "For guys my age, there's a really good movie out there, called The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly. That's what we saw tonight. The good, the bad, and the ugly." A slow start and plenty of defensive lapses offered a lot of room for coaching and for growth. The speed of Yorkton's top line might have caught the Red Wings defence off guard early, which led to quite a few scoring chances.

Rudy also spoke of everybody being more prepared from puck-drop. It's only game one of a long season, so some rust and sloppiness was expected. On the bright side, the special teams looked great, with the powerplay operating at 33 percent and the penalty kill doing a fantastic job early on.

Teams would be in trouble if they were at their best in September and October. At the end of the day, winning is winning and there are no pictures on the scoresheet. I'm certain the Red Wings will gladly take the two points and will only get better as the season goes on.

This is a team worth watching night in and night out and the sky's the limit for what they can accomplish. It should be a great season, Red Wings fans.