Calgary Flames at Philadelphia Flyers game preview: cheese steaks are delicious

Calgary is fresh off dealing former first round pick Sven Baertschi and chuckwagon riding hero Curtis Glencross. Oh and they’re all exhausted from the 24 hour prayer circles they’re doing in hopes of reducing the recovery time of captain Mark Giordano’s torn bicep. There are talks of ritualistic sacrifice deep in the heart of the Saddledome.

The Flyers, well they got a ransom for Braydon Coburn from Tampa Bay. They also traded away blood-clot survivor and all-round awesome guy Kimmo Timonen to the Blackhawks. Outside of that, they play in a city with delicious cheese steaks. Check out our pals at Broad Street Hockey if you want to learn more.

The Flames current Eastern Conference roadtrip is less than enjoyable. One win, one wounded captain, and two losses isn’t anything to write home about. The game against the Islanders ended in a 2-1 loss while the Flyers are in the middle of a three game homestand. They kicked it off by defeating the Rangers 4-2 on Saturday.

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Game time: 5:00 p.m. MT, because the eastern time zone is still awful and it's too early for hockey

Channel: SNW so PVR the right station if you're stuck in traffic.

All-time record: Including the Atlanta Flames — 46-62-12-2. The Flames have a lifetime -46 goal differential against the Flyers too. The last time we beat the Flyers was a shootout victory in 2010-11 by a score of 3-2.

Common threads: Both teams are trying to determine their fates as they're both playoff bubble teams at this point in the season. Remember the late Brad McCrimmon? Prior to playing for the Flames and winning a cup, he was a member of the Flyers.

Approaching milestones: Deryk Engelland: one more game for 300 in his career. Mason Raymond: seven more games to hit 500. Kris Russell: 8 more games until 500. David Jones: 10 goals until 100. TJ Brodie: six points until 100.

How about those Flyers? Ray Emery and Steve Mason are each five wins away from 150. Claude Giroux, noted butt toucher is one assist away from 300 in the career. Chris Pronger if he was still playing would be two points away from 700 but instead he is giving out rich creamy justice for the Department of Player Safety.

Scoreboard watching:

Ottawa vs Minnesota – Minnesota is looking to pull ahead and tie Vancouver with 75 points. They're currently three points up on Calgary.

Los Angeles vs Edmonton – Remember how great it was for LA to lose to the Jets the other night? Let’s hope that our northern rivals who perpetually fail at rebuilding can assist us in defeating the Kings.

San Jose vs Vancouver – Tomorrow night’s catch-22 game. A win would give the Sharks 70 points while a victory for the Canucks moves them to 77 points. Most reasonable request: John Scott knocks everyone including himself out cold and the game is cancelled. Points are donated to a foundation.

Current records and leaders

Possible starting lineups – Subject to immense change

by Mike Pfeil