Mike Harrington: This didn't feel like an NHL debut. It felt like Owen Power has been here all along

The Sabres said Sunday and Monday that it felt like Owen Power had been here all along. Then he took the ice and played a game. And he looked that way when it mattered too.

Don Granato knew what the moment meant. He had Power on the ice in the starting lineup. Against Auston Matthews' line.

"Honestly. I had no anxiety because I've watched him play so much," Granato said. "He has such a calm to him and such a presence. You see his ability to almost slow the game down ... I just knew he would he would get a feel for the pace and everything right away."

Peyton Krebs won the draw back to Power, who made a routine pass up the ice through the neutral zone. A few seconds later, Matthews flipped a backhand over the glass to draw a delay of game penalty, with Power quickly raising his hand to alert officials.

Power skated to the bench. His NHL career was under way. Calm and efficient.

"Once you have the first one out of the way, you kind of get into the game," Power said. "I think it kind of calmed my nerves down."

After yet another raking of the Toronto Maple Leafs, Tuesday's 5-2 drubbing in Scotiabank Arena, Alex Tuch couldn't stop smiling. The veteran had two sparkling assists in the game on goals by Tage Thompson and Jeff Skinner, and I think every reporter packed into the room deep inside the building forgot to ask him about it because it was all Power all the time.

Tuch used words such as smooth and poised. He said he sensed no panic in Power's game. He said it looked like the 19-year-old had been in the NHL 10 years already.

"He's a really nice kid. Little quiet, so far. We'll probably break him here shortly," a smiling Tuch said. "He's very professional, comes in prepared to play and no one really had to tell him anything different."

Power has seven games left this season, starting with Thursday's home debut against St. Louis, to continue to get the feel for the NHL and better understand what it will take to be a 23-minute-a-game stud come October. He landed at 19:50 on Tuesday.

Power is going to struggle from time to time. The goal here is for him to not have nearly as many trouble spots, which is what you're thinking you should get from the No. 1 overall pick. Jacob Bryson and Casey Fitzgerald are gritty, nose-to-the-grindstone workers, but they're at the early stage of their careers where you just don't know what you will get from them from night to night.

The Sabres have four prime defenseman at 22 or under. Henri Jokiharju had a sensational game alongside Power and stopped a 2-on-1 of his own by deflecting a Matthews pass and turning the puck up ice, where it led to Jeff Skinner's goal and a 3-1 Sabres lead. Rasmus Dahlin scored a goal and again was a magician with the puck. Mattias Samuelsson bounced back well from Sunday's minus-4 disaster in Tampa Bay.

Organizationally, Buffalo is quickly forming one of the best young groups of blueliners in the NHL. Pretty good starting point for a franchise.

Power said he feels he can expand his game. He was cautious about jumping up into the play, when you could clearly see him take that first stride looking to go. On night one in the NHL, discretion was a good idea. Don't expect Power to be too deferential in that area for too long.

"I knew it was obviously going to be a step up but I think at the end of the day, it's just hockey," Power said. 

Power was also elated with the poise his team showed. The season series with the Leafs is really hard to believe. The first meeting in November saw Toronto eke out a win in its lone visit to Buffalo on Morgan Rielly's goal with 11 seconds left. Then the Sabres dumped them three straight and outscored them 15-5.

"I don't know that we've done something masterful against the Leafs," said Granato, who noted his team didn't get rewarded in Carolina or Florida at the start of this trip, despite building two-goal leads. "It's worked out. We've worked hard and taken advantage of breaks."

The Leafs should have been buzzing in this game, given the way the Sabres took them to the cleaners twice in March and ran them out of Tim Horton's Field in the Heritage Classic. They should have still felt the anger from Matthews' two-game suspension for nearly beheading Dahlin.

Matthews was again dangerous, with four shots on goal, including a couple that forced Craig Anderson to make some good saves. But it was weird for Toronto to not get much from anybody else. Mitch Marner was as invisible as he was while not scoring a goal in last year's seven-game playoff loss to Montreal. Rookie Erik Kallgren was pedestrian, showing a weak glove hand.

"I think we've come to work, we've gotten a lot of energy and I think we've had really good starts against them," Tuch said.

Power said he loved going head to head with Matthews. He was asked if it really was just hockey once the game got under way. He kind of went back and forth for a bit with his answer and then settled on a middle ground.

"It's still hockey, just against better players," Power said.

He handled it fine. It was brilliant to see. His friends and family greeted him in the stands afterward for just a few minutes, then it was off to the bus. Time for Buffalo fans to see the show Thursday night.