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Calgary Flames Official Thread

That's more like it ... sort of.
Flames win 7-4, with 2 empty netters near the end of the game from Czarnik and Frolik to secure the game.
Tkachuk had a 4pt night, Gaudreau, Gio, and Lindholm 3pts each, Lindholm with 2 goals looks like an absolute stud on the first line.

Was a close game for most of it, mind you, it was 5-4 before the two empty netters. Smith made one absolute monster save to keep us in, and that's all the good I can really say about him tonight unfortunately. I absolutely love Smith, and I know it's only 2 games in, but these sub-.900 save percentages are getting to be troubling. He sat at .667% for a lot of the game before muscling back to .800, which is still not great, especially considering the opponent. I'm confident he can get back and it's good we were able to outscore what he let in regardless, but it's not a great start.

It can't all be blamed on Smith, Pettersson was really good yet again, and for both of his goals he was left wide open. Defense need to do a better job keeping star players at bay.

Oh well though, a win is a win, and this was about as exciting as it gets. Some other good news, we had 3 ... count 'em ... THREE powerplay goals tonight!
That's more like it!
 
I think Smith will dial it in, they had 4 goals on 12 shots at one point I believe. Games where the goalie goes long periods without any major action followed by a couple minutes of tough offense by the other team usually results in a goal if the goalie is even just slightly off.
 
Nice win tonight. Smith was dialed in 100% Interesting game tonight, The score was lopsided in favor of the Flames, and the shots lopsided in favor of Nashville, but the game was closer that both would indicate.
 
Got back from vacation finally :)

Smith's had a history of playing unbelievably badly right after a shutout. His game in Nashville was spectacular, and I too, was confident he'd get a well-deserved rest against STL. Instead he rewarded with yet another start. As history would tell you, that didn't work out so well.

We hit a lot of posts and had unlucky breaks, and you can't blame it all on Smith either, a lot of those goals that went in were good quality shots. The goal that irked me was the one that made it 4-1. He misplayed the puck behind the net, then instead of rushing back and doing whatever he could to fix his mistake, he unemotionally waddled back, not putting so much as a paddle out to even attempt to stop it from going in. He barely even bent down, and hardly reacted when it went in. Smith is known as one of the fiercest, most competitive goalies in the league. I didn't see that in this game. Yes, the puck moves quickly, but I'm pretty sure he could've made that save.

Better news vs Colorado, what a great comeback! The whole team was great from 2:40 onwards, everyone buckled down and kept pushing. Bennett played a very strong, spirited game and was finally rewarded with a goal, Neal's looking better, the D's were solid, Rittich kept us in it, Lindholm had a great steal and a clutch goal, and Johnny finished it off with a beauty. Rittich was celebrating that goal before it even went in, found that adorable haha.

I hate ripping on Smith so much, because he's legitimately one of my favorite players in the NHL, but other than Nashville he's been very shaky to start this off. I have full faith that he'll settle down and be back to his usual game-stealing self, but personally I'm kind of in favour of Rittich starting the next game or two. Might send a message to Smith that this isn't good enough, and reward Rittich for playing exceptionally well so far.
 
Last year in games after a shutout win Smith was 0-3, including a couple of really bad games. Maybe he needs to be rested in games after a shutout...at least to try something different. Glad to see Rittich step up...also loving the play of that top line with Lindholm so far.
 
Fun game last night vs Boston. Got off to a really fast start, 3 goals in the first period.
Frolik, coming off being a healthy scratch, had 2 goals, happy for him, seems like a nice guy. I'm still agitated seeing Neal on the 3rd line, but if the 3M line plays every game like they did this one, it'll be hard to justify breaking them up.
Smith was good, much closer to where I expect him to be, saving 24 of 26 with a sv% of .923%.

That McAvoy hit on Johnny in the 3rd sent him to the quiet room, he's listed as day to day, we'll find out tomorrow because I guess they had no practice today. Scary, hope he's okay.
 
Mountain Man said:
Flames are already showing the kind of lacklustre effort that doomed them last year, hope they start playing harder and stop relying on goaltending.
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Yep. On the other hand the Canucks are actually on top of the division despite injuries. I did get a laugh out of Casuck Fans on Twitter. They are going ape shit over having a 6-4 record. Meanwhile the Flames fans are not happy with the 5-4 record
 
Hope they got all that suckage out of their system. It's pretty bad when the Dome is chanting "we want 10" in support of the road team! lol
 
Yeah, that was a total stinker. Everyone who went to that game deserves a refund. Hopefully they'll wake up now.
Imo, I think they should've woken up when they allowed 80+ shots in 2 games vs NYR and MTL. Tkachuk spoke up, said exactly what I was thinking, and I thought they'd move forward from there. Nope.

I think this video highlights our issues quite well. The defense aren't staying on their men, they're caught puck-watching and don't take away passing and shooting lanes. I hope they watch some of their own video and fix this quickly. Read a tweet from someone today that that Flames have allowed the most dangerous scoring chances of any team, something like 15 per game, 150 so far this season. That's pathetic.

Personally, I'd rather they struggle early, get it sorted out, and perform well for the majority of the season, rather than fall apart down the stretch. 2 points is 2 points regardless of what month it is, but at least we have a lot of the season to make up for it.
Next two matchups are Washington and Toronto. I'm expecting a bounce back, and at the very least a solid effort in both games, if not a win or two as well.
 
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The boys are on fire since the Pens ran the train on the goaltenders, lets hope they can keep it up in Anaheim tonight! Lindholm has looked incredible so far, wasn't too sure about that trade, but seeing how well he's doing, and how bag Hamilton is doing so far, I think it's worth it. Ferland is killing it so far this year though!
 
If Calgary hadn't have won in Anaheim last year, I would have been feeling like it was streak ending night tonight. They always have a tough time there, so hopefully the can build on last year's win.
Mountain Man said:
The boys are on fire since the Pens ran the train on the goaltenders, lets hope they can keep it up in Anaheim tonight! Lindholm has looked incredible so far, wasn't too sure about that trade, but seeing how well he's doing, and how bag Hamilton is doing so far, I think it's worth it. Ferland is killing it so far this year though!
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