Months of preparation led up to it. The signings, the trades, even someone stepping directly from last June’s NHL Draft into an AHL line-up. The schedule came out three months ago. Then NHL training camp and preseason games, perhaps waivers for the more experienced players, AHL training camp, and more preseason play.

Finally it was here. The real deal -- opening weekend of play in the AHL. At long last teams and their fans could get the earliest real glimpses of what might be in store this season, what needs some work, and where to go next. And, of course, points earned – or squandered – as the season begins can become very significant once the Calder Cup Playoff stretch drive arrives.

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Let’s break down some early impressions

Hershey Bears

Hershey raised (another) Calder Cup banner. They only commemorate championships in Hershey, as Bears fans like to say.

Opening night provided an emphatic 7-3 win at Giant Center against Cleveland, the team that they finally put away in overtime of Game 7 in last June’s Eastern Conference Finals. Then came a 6-3 defeat to that same Monsters team a night later. So, there is definitely some work to do for head coach Todd Nelson and his staff, but they knew that anyway. After what may well have been the best combined regular season and postseason performance in AHL history, the Bears are back for more. With hat tricks from Ethen Frank and Ivan Miroshnichenko on back-to-back nights, this Bears team is loaded. If someone else is to win the Calder Cup this season, they will have to wrestle it away from the Bears.

Abbotsford Canucks

This is a huge career point for defenseman Erik Brannstrom.

The 25-year-old has had a somewhat winding path back to the AHL. After spending most of the past three seasons with Ottawa, he signed with Colorado on the second day of free agency only to find himself shipped to Vancouver as training camp ended. Then he cleared waivers and was sent to Abbotsford. Everybody knows the type of elite puck-moving skill that Brannstrom owns. Nobody should expect him to reinvent himself as a shutdown defenseman in Abbotsford, let alone in Vancouver. But perhaps a new start can provide the refinement that will allow him to bring out the best parts of his game if he does go to Vancouver at some point.

Not in action for a two-game set at Calgary was Christian Wolanin, the 2022-23 Eddie Shore Award winner as the AHL’s top defenseman. Whenever he enters the line-up, Abbotsford will have two of the most offensively dangerous defensemen in the league.

Belleville Senators

The B-Sens have long been a hard-nosed team that is willing to work. If there is one element that they have lacked, though, it’s an elite sniper. After all, most teams do have to get by without a luxury like that. Not the B-Sens. They have Adam Gaudette now after Ottawa assigned him to Belleville on Tuesday. Last season he devoted much of his attention to building out a two-way game to work his way back to the NHL and along the way also piled up a league-best 44 goals with Springfield.

Charlotte Checkers

Aidan McDonough let his work on the ice speak as well. After not getting an NHL contract in the summer, the 24-year-old forward went to the Checkers on an AHL deal. He delivered a hat trick on opening night in a wild 7-6 win at Wilkes-Barre/Scranton before chipping in another one the following afternoon at Bridgeport.

The Checkers are a team that is willing to add some significant talent via AHL contracts. Trevor Carrick came back on one. Kyle Criscuolo took an AHL offer from Charlotte. McDonough might be able to play his way into an NHL deal before long.

Aidan McDonough is your AHL Player of the Week! 🏆

With an opening night hat trick and four goals in two games to open the season, McDonough is off to a hot start for the Charlotte Checkers 🔥🏒@TheAHL | @CheckersHockey #AHL pic.twitter.com/ApipwekJUf

— FloHockey (@FloHockey) October 14, 2024

Cleveland Monsters

Rookie Denton Mateychuk slotted into a top pairing with Cole Clayton. No surprise. In fact, each of the Monsters’ defensive pairings had at least one top prospect – Samuel Knazko and Stanislav Svozil paired up while first-rounder Corson Ceulemans featured in another pairing.

In a 2023-24 Cleveland season that contained so many impressive moments, Mateychuk’s entry into the Eastern Conference Finals surely ranked among them. The WHL’s top defenseman of the year and most valuable player of the playoffs, Mateychuk went directly from his Memorial Cup run with Moose Jaw and into head coach Trent Vogelhuber’s line-up midway through last June’s fight with Hershey. He immediately fit in and looked every bit the polished pro even against elite competition and in a difficult environment like Hershey.

Columbus Blue Jackets management could have justified pushing Mateychuk into the NHL coming out of training camp. Instead they have him in Cleveland, where he can take on top-pairing minutes and fine-tune his details. This will be an NHL player soon enough.

Coachella Valley Firebirds

Twice the Firebirds have made the long, long climb up the mountain only to be stopped just short. In 2023 it was a Game 7 overtime loss in the Calder Cup Finals. Another series-ending overtime loss followed in the 2024 Finals, that one coming in Game 6.

For the first time, though, this is going to be a much more traditional roster for the Firebirds. With four draft classes now in place for the Seattle Kraken, rookies and top prospects will have a much more dominant presence with the Firebirds, who have had a significant elite veteran presence these past two seasons.

Jagger Firkus, he of a 61-goal season last year with Moose Jaw, certainly made his first pro goal a stylish one in a 2-1 opening-night loss to Bakersfield. Coachella Valley’s returning players know all too well how difficult the eight-month journey to the Finals is. Now they have to show the newcomers how it’s done.

🎪 THE FIRKUS CIRCUS IS OPEN!!! 🎪

Jagger Firkus with an absolute SNIPE got the @Firebirds back in this one. You like that, @SeattleKraken fans? #AHL #SeaKraken #LetsFly pic.twitter.com/ttvNuOgXBU

— FloHockey (@FloHockey) October 12, 2024

Laval Rocket

Well, Logan Mailloux certainly wasted no time in picking up where he left off last April.

If Mailloux took returning to the AHL hard, he certainly did not show it. Or maybe he chose to let his play do the speaking for him instead. His two goals and a pair of assists on opening night at Providence carried the Rocket to a 5-2 win. This can be the year where he goes from an impressive rookie to a dominant presence.

Everyone expects the Rocket to be one of the league’s most interesting groups to watch given the cache of young prospects that the Montreal Canadiens have provided. But now Laval has added Alex Barré-Boulet, an elite playmaker. He was someone who had signed a one-way deal this past summer, so it’s at least something of an extra bonus for head coach Pascal Vincent’s line-up.

Milwaukee Admirals

Forward Fedor Svechkov is back with the Admirals following an injury during training camp with Nashville.

A 2021 first-round pick, the 21-year-old Svechkov is coming off a more-than-solid first season in Milwaukee, where he had 16-23-39 in 57 regular-season games followed by a 6-6-12 postseason as the Admirals went to the Western Conference Finals for the second year in a row.

Syracuse Crunch

Crunch goaltender Brandon Halverson continues to author an impressive comeback story 

A 2014 second-pick by the New York Rangers, Halverson before too long saw his career threatened by injuries. At one point he had slid down to a second-division team in Germany after missing the entire 2021-22 season. He got back into the Tampa Bay Lightning ecosystem, first finding traction with the ECHL’s Orlando Solar Bears and then impressing enough in Syracuse to secure a two-year AHL contract. By the time the playoffs had arrived, the Crunch went with him in net.

He came through again on opening night, too, shutting down the Utica Comets with 26 stops in a 5-0 win.

Help Wanted

If a front office is looking at its AHL roster and feeling like it could really use a boost, well, the good news is that it’s not too late. High-end talent is still out there.

Need a goaltender? Michael Hutchinson is a free agent again after spending training camp with New Jersey. So is Kasimir Kaskisuo, who was with Boston in training camp. He had to wait two months into last season before signing with Laval, where he was able to help solidify the Rocket in net and help undo a poor start.

A pair of defensemen from last season’s postseason push in Cleveland, Markus Bjork and Jakub Zboril are both free agents. Like Hutchinson, Zboril went to training camp with New Jersey. His background includes 76 NHL games.

Forward Rocco Grimaldi had to wait until the afternoon of opening night in the AHL to finally land a job. He took a PTO with Cleveland after finishing third in the AHL with 36 goals last season for a Chicago team that missed the Calder Cup Playoffs. Amid a mess of a season so far for Barys Astana of the KHL, newcomers Wade Allison and Chase De Leo, both familiar AHL names, took some of the fall for that and were put on KHL waivers even though they had barely been there long enough to unpack their bags. Where each players’ KHL contract stands at the moment is unknown, but if they become available at some point they each could help.

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