Mike Cammalleri is being moved to Centre and it remains to be seen if he will be successful. A Centre is not the same as a Winger, it is a much more challenging position. It is common to have a Centre downgrade to Winger without much concern but the transition from Winger to Centre is much rarer.

Mark Messier is an example of a former Winger who made the move to Centre with tremendous success but other examples are few and far between.

Cammalleri does have the historic advantage of being a Centre in the distant past and this certainly bodes well but it is not exactly a position that has stood still in time. He will be a player to watch closely tonight. Those who have not fully appreciated Mikael Backlund and his contributions should watch Cammalleri for his positioning and how he tends to his defensive responsibilities.

The position in the modern NHL has become one of the most important.

Make the jump for a update in the playoff race. The Canucks just couldn't do the Flames a favor last night with a clean win in regulation.

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The NHL playoffs are well under way with two first-round series already concluded and the favoured Detroit Red Wings and Washington Capitals have emerged victorious; but after the Nashville Predators disposed of the Anaheim Ducks and the Chicago Blackhawks evened up their series with the Vancouver Canucks with a 4-3 overtime win last night, two more lower-seeded teams have a chance to do just that tonight. 

The Tampa Bay Lightning and the Los Angeles Kings are both coming off wins against their respective opponents, and both could force a do-or-die deciding game by besting their competition this evening. With two series already going to seven games, two more teams forcing a deciding contest would be a very exciting way to close out the first round. Seeing the Canucks complete the collapse after being up three games to none would be wonderful, but unfortunately, we all know that the game that matters most to Flames fans won't come until early October. 

Links after the jump. 

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Being a Flames fan is kind of depressing these days. After Saturday's close call against the league's worst team in the Edmonton Oilers, the team has just five games remaining to right the ship, and barring a perfect record in those games, a playoff position is extremely unlikely. I think it would be less depressing if the team had remained in 14th place all season rather than doling out false hope for two months only to come crashing abruptly down to their rightful place in the standings as a perfectly mediocre hockey club. 

As much as I'd like to fit in with the cool, level-headed analyst crowd by saying I'm not surprised by the Flames' fall to the position where everyone expected them to finish the season, the likelihood of missing the playoffs for the second consecutive season still stings. As a fan, as much as you try and prepare yourself for failure, you just can't. Leafs fans have to go into every season hoping that the drought will end just like Boston Red Sox fans prior to 2004 had to believe the Curse of the Bambino would be lifted. Failure is part of sports and sports fandom, but expecting it shouldn't always be. 

As much as you know that the product management is putting on the ice before your very eyes is inferior and not good enough to compete with eight other teams for a playoff spot, there's always that little part of you that hopes you're wrong, that they're all wrong. That something, anything will happen that will clear the path for your team to rise to the occasion and exceed expectations. And when it doesn't, and that little bit of hope is extinguished and the team crumbles, well, that 's the part that hurts the most; that's what it feels to be a Flames fan right now. For me anyways. 

Links after the jump. 

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Last night's loss to the Anaheim Ducks has left many Flames fans reeling in frustration and despair today, in fear that the club's slim playoff hopes will not be realized. The team vaulted themselves into post-season contention with a lengthy stretch of improved play and some good fortune over the course of some two and a half months, but with four losses in their past five games and a couple devastating injuries, the Flames have fallen back to down to earth--or more accurately, where most predicted they would finish the season: on the bubble in an ultra-competitive Western Conference, somewhere in-between eighth and fifteenth. 

The merits of the team making the playoffs versus missing them and using the off-season to begin the long-anticipated teardown have been debated at length since the team found themselves within striking distance of the top eight, and unsurprisingly, no consensus has been reached. There are those who want to see the Flames make the playoffs even if it means they will just be cannon fodder for the Canucks or Red Wings and there are those who feel that missing out on the dance will serve as a push in the right direction for a rebuild to take place--but will it? 

Of course there are strengths and weaknesses on both sides; one side appeals to the emotional never-say-die part of being a fan, while the other side appeals to rational logic and what is likely best for the team going forward, and Flames fans have struggled with an internal and external battle between the two for some time now. I suppose it comes down to short-term versus long-term success, and the way the Flames are built right now, they can't have both--it's rare that an NHL team can these days without going through some sort of a re-structuring process. 

After the magic of 2003-04, five consecutive seasons of playoff hockey conditioned us to appreciate and expect the instant gratification of a post-season berth, of meaningful hockey games after early April, even if only for a couple of weeks. Now--or rather, after eight more cardiac-arrest inducing games--the off-seasons are longer; failure cannot be justified with the phrase: "at least we made the playoffs." Maybe we have to learn to wait again in hopes that it will be all be worth it sometime in the (hopefully near) future. 

Links after the jump. 

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After back-to-back losses to the Canucks and Coyotes on late last week, the Flames' position in the standings is a precarious one. 

With a tenuous grip on eighth place, they've still played more games than any other team in the Western Conference, and that will continue tomorrow night when they face the Phoenix Coyotes for the second time in less than a week after being shutout by the desert dogs in their last meeting. 

The team's play has been worrying of late, and has some wondering if the Flames are coming down to earth after a lengthy stretch of good fortune--some deserved, some not. Despite pushing the pace for the better part of two periods Thursday in Glendale they couldn't overcome a slim 1-0 deficit heading into the third period and fell by a final score of 3-0 with an empty net goal added in the dying seconds. In Saturday's game, two leads were erased by the Canucks, who exposed what has been a rock solid penalty kill up until now with their league-best man advantage unit. Contests against some of the better teams in the West like the Sharks, Blackhawks, and Canucks have resulted in losses that have made the separation between them and the Flames evident, and have made fans fearful of a potential first-round playoff matchup. 

The reality is that these are desperate times. With a few more lengthy breaks (three days or more) in the schedule that will enable other teams to catch up as the season rounds out, the Flames have to get back to finding ways to get points, plain and simple. With only two games remaining against those upper-level teams, the Flames have one of the easier schedules going forward, in theory of course--their recent play doesn't provide much encouragement that they'll properly take advantage of this. I'm more than open to being proved wrong, but at this moment in time the seeds of doubt are definitely there. 

Links after the jump. 

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