Miscues Cost Flames in Loss to Rangers

The Calgary Flames entered Sunday afternoon’s contest having not won in New York since December 7, 2008.

That streak continued as the Flames fell 4-3 to the Rangers in what was a high paced afternoon contest between the clubs.

The game started well for the Flames as they opened the scoring on the powerplay with a Dougie Hamilton shot redirecting off a Ranger in front of the net. However, New York would tie the game on their own powerplay with Rick Nash finding a rebound in the goalmouth to beat Elliott.

The second period would feature no scoring as the game calmed down following a hectic opening period.

New York would take the 2-1 lead with the Flames all being drawn to Brady Skjei, before he found Michael Grabner across the ice who put the puck into the yawning cage.

Troy Brouwer would get the game squared up again only a few minutes later by swiftly depositing a Johnny Gaudreau rebound by Lundqvist.

Off the following faceoff Kris Versteeg and Pavel Buchnevich would get into a fight, which unfortunately resulted in Versteeg being ejected from the game for not having his jersey tied down. It was a shame because Versteeg had been flying today before that.

New York would find themselves up again when Chris Kreider used Dennis Wideman as a screen and shot a hard wrister through his legs to make it 3-2.

It would then be made 4-2 with a bad turnover off the end boards by Matt Stajan as he and Jyrki Jokipakka misplayed a puck that ended up in front for Jesper Fast who made no mistake.

Calgary would get back to within one with seven and a half minutes left when Matthew Tkachuk deflected a Mikael Backlund shot for his tenth goal of the season.

The Flames would muster a few good opportunities late with the goalie pulled but were unable to find the tying goal.

The loss snapped a three game winning streak for the Flames and put a damper on what was overall a strong performance by the Flames.

The Good

The Bad

The Ugly

Calgary falls to 27-25-3 and next plays on Tuesday when the visit the defending Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins. Puck drop is at 5:00PM MT.

by Michael MacGillivray