Of the 16 games on the first three nights of the NHL regular season, only two went to overtime — the Flyers vs. Lightning at Tampa on Thursday, then the Blackhawks vs. Islanders at Brooklyn on Friday. Significantly, both ended in OT, rather than going to a shootut.
Tampa Bay claimed the 3-2 win when defenseman Jason Garrison scored on a breakaway at 2:17 of OT. And the Blackhawks won by the same score in OT on Patrick Kane's power-play goal at 1:49.
The exhibition season provided hints that the new 3-on-3 format would result in wild, wide-open overtimes that rarely will be scoreless.