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Calgary Flames

Good 5, Evil 3 – G8, Canucks at Flames Post-Game

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Corsi

Scoring Chances

NHL.com Recap

Let's get this out of the way right now:

SUCK IT VANCOUVER!

Ok back to rational discussion. Tonight the Flames had something to prove. They came out, and they proved… something. Not sure what – maybe that old adage about leopards and spots? The team’s still a work in progress.

However, here is what I said in Tuesday's post-game:

Oh well. Let’s hope the Flames regroup for Thursday against the Canucks. Honestly priority #1 in that game for me is to win it, I don’t care how bad we play as long as we get 2 points and Vancouver gets zero. But it’d be nice if they played well.

Mission accomplished!
Breakdown by period:

1st
EV shots: 6-6
EV Corsi: +3 Calgary

2nd
EV shots: 10-7 Vancouver
EV Corsi: +4 Vancouver

3rd
EV shots: 5-4 Vancouver
EV Corsi: +7 Vancouver

Overall
EV shots: 21-17 Vancouver
EV Corsi: +8 Vancouver

Breakdown before and after 5-0:

Before
EV shots: 12-11 Calgary
EV Corsi: +5 Calgary

After
EV shots: 10-5 Vancouver
EV Corsi: +13 Vancouver

The Flames are getting shit-kicked in the media for choking away leads. The PBP don't lie – Calgary has been coming out strong and converting consistent zone pressure into goals, only to give it all back and more.

This game was no different. Calgary spent a ton of time with the puck on their sticks or behind Luongo – in the first half of the game. After the back-breaking fifth goal, it's as if 14 or so switches collectively flipped to the OFF position. An unfortunate Giordano lost skate edge in the neutral zone late in the second led to two consecutively awful shifts spent running around our zone – but one could be forgiven for chalking this up to bad luck, no?

NO! The third period was more of the same. Lots of time in spent in our zone, lots of pucks directed towards our net, and general chaos all around. Ironically the Canucks only netted one goal from this pressure, a perfectly placed short-side top-shelf shot that Kipper probably still should have shouldered away. Two bogus penalties (and a legit too-many-men) later, Vancouver made the game "interesting".

Notables:

– Iginla and Jokinen still suck. Coach Sutter definitely avoided Jokinen vs. tough comp (he had a few double shifts with Iginla but they seemed to be against the Kesler or Wellwood lines – someone correct me if they saw differently). Iginla didn't look disastrous beside Conroy and Glencross, but he didn't stand out. That makes the Jarmoe count 7.5/8 for the season by my estimation. Balls.

– Boyd was dominant tonight. Kent counted 14 scoring chances for the Flames tonight, and by my estimation Boyd was directly responsible for at least 4 of them. In eight minutes of ice time. Yeah. Boyd is the bet for the future of Flames offense. One awesome game vs. weak comp proves nothing, but it's a nice arrow to start the collection.

– Regehr looked a lot better today. He had two outstanding vintage-Regehr moves tonight: body the forward to gain position, clear the puck. 'Bout fucking time.

– Bouwmeester and Sarich got the tough assignments today. Bouw went 1-5 for EV scoring chances, Sarich went 0-5. All 5 chances against came from the Sedin unit. Two came in the first period when Bouw-Sarich played behind the Iginla unit (blech) and three came in the panic half of the game.

– The Calgary PP is really, really good. Crisp passes, lots of puck support, quick releases and the down-low forwards are absolutely victimising the D-men when they go after the rebounds. And that's on a night where we *only* go 1 for 4.

– Calgary: 5-2-1, 11 pts; Vancouver: 2-4-0, 4 pts. Enjoy this moment, friends.

by Richard Ong