Game 1 was an unmitigated disaster for the Calgary Flames.
They were played out of the rink in a rout, with the Anaheim Ducks injuring two key players, chasing starting goalie Jonas Hiller and piling up goals (and shots) after the game was long over.
The best news for the Flames is it was only one, ugly game.
The bad news is they were heavy underdogs to begin with, and this could be a short series if they no-show like this again.
"They were hungry to play," Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau said of his team, which had seven days off between rounds. "They were tired of practising."
Calgary has been the NHL's feel-good story all season. After finishing fourth last a year ago, many expected them to be in the Connor McDavid sweepstakes this season, especially in the difficult Western Conference.
But L.A. faltered. And San Jose faltered. Arizona imploded, and Edmonton was, well, Edmonton.
Suddenly, not only was the Pacific Division not a war, it was one of the easier paths to the playoffs, with three teams guaranteed to make it in the NHL's new format and four of the seven falling apart.
Calgary took advantage with a dream season for a young, rebuilding team, eventually piling up 97 points.
How they did it was odd – an almost inexplicable combination of good timing, underrated talent and puck luck. They were dominant when a goalie was pulled, for example, outscoring their opponents 22-12, getting a lot of those late tying goals and rarely giving them up.
They spent more time on the power play compared to the penalty kill than any other team in the league. They led the NHL in wins when trailing after the first period (13-14-3) and were third when trailing after the second (10-20-4).
The Flames were the unbelievable comeback kids, again and again. Then they knocked off Vancouver convincingly in Round 1, and here we are.
But Anaheim is a different challenge.
The Ducks swept a pretty solid, up-and-coming Winnipeg Jets team in the first round with some comebacks of their own, and that brought about a lot of soul-searching about what exactly was wrong with their opponent. But there probably wasn't enough focus on how good Anaheim was.
The Ducks have the makings of a legitimate Stanley Cup contender. Their moves to shore up their blueline and add forward depth at the trade deadline have helped, but this is a very underrated core, filled with players like Patrick Maroon and Matt Beleskey and Jakob Silfverberg that don't get enough attention around the league.
Obviously Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry are stars, even without a deep run since winning the Cup eight years ago, but what Anaheim has done better than almost any other organization is find talent from middling positions in the draft.
This is as club getting more contributions than almost anyone else from young players, most of whom they drafted – Sami Vatanen, Kyle Palmieri, Cam Fowler, Emerson Etem, Rickard Rakell, Hampus Lindholm, Frederik Andersen – since 2009.
That's three of their top four D, their starting goalie and three key depth forwards. Only Lindholm was a top 10 pick.
So they're proof you can do it without bottoming out.
All of that's a long-winded way of saying the Flames are up against it here. Game 1 went about as badly as it could have on Thursday, and the Ducks showed how many different weapons they have. It wasn't a mirage. It wasn't good fortune, although Jonas Hiller can certainly be better.
Anaheim is simply a lot deeper than Calgary, and they can push them around, as evidenced by Flames coach Bob Hartley sitting Johnny Gaudreau for the entire third period. It was an act of preservation. "They were taking way too many liberties on him," Hartley explained.
That's not going to stop.
Further testing their depth, the Flames also lost top liner Jiri Hudler – a top 10 scorer in the NHL this season – and agitator Micheal Ferland, with their status is in doubt for Game 2 on Sunday.
It's all enough to want to write Calgary off already, one game in, if not for the way their season went all year long. No one expected them to make the postseason in October. No one expected them to hang onto their spot when captain Mark Giordano went down with a season-ending injury. Few expected they'd beat Vancouver in Round 1 – although the Canucks are a team they matched up much better with than this.
This is obviously the Flames biggest obstacle yet. The Ducks are hungry and confident and they've got good reason to be.
Calgary? They're in tough. And it'll take some more of that inexplicable magic they had all year to get back in a series that began about as poorly as one can.