Connect with us

Calgary Flames

Abbottsford Heat and Other Flames Prospect News: Dowling Provides Quick Returns

Published

on

Who knows- maybe that Dowling signing will pay off after all.

According to Cam Tucker of the Abbottsford Times, Justin Dowling (who I consistently want to type as “Downey”) scored the only goal in a 1-0 win for the Heat last night. But more importantly, he also looked surprisingly dominant at times.

From the article linked above:

Not only did they watch their son score his first AHL goal, but at times dominate.

“I felt Carter Bancks got tired at the end so it was a situation where I could put Dowling in that position and I thought he saw the ice well, I thought he did a good job,” said Playfair

It's good to hear something positive out of this. Even if Dowling becomes a lifelong AHLer, just having a quality player there for callups and helping develop other prospects is never a bad thing.

* * *

I mentioned this in the last gamethread, but D Tim Erixon‘s team, SkellefteÃ¥ AIK, has made the SEL finals which begin on Tuesday. In the last series he averaged over 24 minutes a game, leading his team. And when that team includes D Adam Larsson and D David Rundblad, that’s a hell of an accomplishment. Robert Cleave talked about both it and the series winning goal Erixon scored over at Flamesnation.

I think it’s likely we’ll see Erixon in Calgary next year. A lot of people are clamoring for him to start in Abbottsford, but that’s really taking a step back, regardless of the “difference between American and European leagues”.

* * *

Due to the lack of quality stats from the CHL, it’s hard to say if this is really because of Our Favorite Forward Prospectâ„¢, but the Kootenay Ice have just been wrecking the Moose Jaw Warriors in terms of shot count, and given the PP goal as well as the 1st star award in the last game, I think it’s safe to say that he’s definitely not hurting the team.

The shot totals from each game in the series? Check it out.

Game Kootenay Moose Jaw Difference
1 30 24 6
2 42 20 22
3 28 22 6
4 37 25 12
5 49 28 21
186 119 67
As you can see, it’s a pretty dominant performance by the Ice. The only games they lost were games in which they failed to record more than 30 SOG. You can’t really tell how much Reinhart is contributing, but my money says a fair amount, which is great news for the future.

by Arik Knapp