Winless Flames find silver lining with Castagna’s debut

CALGARY — Jonathan Castagna has a nickname, a souvenir puck and an NHL assist to his name after one game in the big leagues.

Yes, George. As in George Costanza, the neurotic Seinfeld character. Apparently, the 21-year-old Calgary Flames centre has never watched the show, which made the nickname even funnier to his new teammates.

“We call him George — you can probably understand why,” chuckled coach Ryan Huska.

“When we first started calling him George he said he never watched Seinfeld , if you can believe that. But that is his nickname now.”

Somewhere, Jerry Seinfeld is probably wondering what’s the deal with a Flames rookie who has never seen his namesake.

Castagna, meanwhile, has bigger things to worry about than catching up on reruns. Like turning Thursday’s NHL debut into the beginning of a career.

And on a night when the Flames lost 7-3 to the Colorado Avalanche, falling to 0-4, their rookie centre provided something the scoreboard couldn’t: a reason to smile.

Forget the 23 goals Calgary has allowed while scoring just six through four games. Forget the defensive breakdowns and the mounting evidence that this season is going to require a healthy supply of patience.

For a few minutes Thursday, the story belonged to a kid taking his rookie lap, his mother crying in the owners’ box, and a young man struggling to find words when he saw her reaction.

Castagna’s father, Al, mother, Joyce, and girlfriend, Lexi, made the trip from Toronto to watch him take his first steps in the NHL. They saw him win his first faceoff against veteran Nicolas Roy on his opening shift, help set up Adam Klapka’s spectacular toe-drag goal and collect his first NHL point. His reaction was priceless.

The puck he used to set up Klapka was wrapped in tape and presented to him.

“Really happy that he did that. Obviously, I didn’t have to do much for it, so to get that off my back is really cool. Kudos to him. That was unbelievable.”

He also jumped early on a shift, costing his team a too-many-men penalty in the first period.

“I guess I just blacked out and didn’t hear Husk say the other names, so completely on me,” Castagna admitted.