Preview: Calgary Flames @ St. Louis Blues 11/21/19 (25/82): Road Trip From Hell Begins In St. Louis

Calgary Flames @ St. Louis Blues 6 PM MT, Enterprise Center, St. Louis MO

TV: SNW – Radio: Sportsnet 960

Calgary Flames 10-11-3 (23 pts) – St. Louis Blues 13-4-5 (31 pts)

NHL Standings

The Flames nightmare-ish road trip begins with a stop in St. Louis to take on the defending Stanley Cup Champion Blues. Calgary is currently mired in a five game losing skid and seems actually worse than that. The Flames finally broke through and scored twice against Colorado Tuesday night, snapping a streak of seven straight periods without a goal.

Calgary is getting workhorse like efforts in goal from Cam Talbot and David Rittich, but you feel like if they surrender two goals there’s zero chance to win. Another area Calgary is struggling in is getting the first goal of a game. The Flames have given up the first goal in eight straight games, five of which they’ve lost. Playing from behind is tough when you’re doing well. Playing from behind when you’re the Flames is a death sentence. Adding to Calgary’s uphill battle will be the fact that they will be without T.J. Brodie, Travis Hamonic and Sam Bennett for who knows how long.

St. Louis comes into this game having just snapped a four game winning streak and despite that short run of futility they are still tops in the Central Division and tied with Edmonton for the top spot in the Western Conference. What’s even more astounding is how they’ve gotten to this point in the season. The Blues have played 10 games that have gone to OT or a shoot out, winning five of those including three in a row.

St. Louis won’t kill you with an overabundance of goals, as they sit 16th in the league in GF with 63. But they will spread the wealth and make life difficult for opposing teams. They have seven players in double digits when it comes to goal scoring and they are scoring 23.6% of the time on the PP (7th).

These two last met on November 9th with St. Louis winning 3-2 in OT and coincidentally, started the Flames current five game skid. Enterprise Center has not been very welcoming to the Flames as they have gone 3-7-0 in their last 10 trips to St. Louis. Not exactly the kindest place to try and right the ship and the Flames had better start turning because this four game trip could be the make or break trip of the season.

Starting Goalies (E=Expected,C=Confirmed)

Flames: Rittich (E)- 9-6-3, 2.73 GAA, .914 Save%

Blues: Binnington (E)- 10-3-4, 2.31 GAA, .920 Save%

Team Leaders

Flames: Goals: Tkachuk (10) Points: Tkachuk (20) PIM: Lucic (34) Save%: Rittich (.914)

Blues: Goals: Schenn (11) Points: Perron (20) PIM: Perron (20) Save%: Binnington (.920)

What’s Happening With The Opposition?

St. Louis Blues Coverage: St. Louis Game Time

Last Time Out

Calgary Flames 2 – Colorado Avalanche 3

St. Louis Blues 3 – Tampa Bay 1

Players to Watch

Calgary Flames

Andrew Mangiapane (F): 2 points in last 5 games

St. Louis Blues

David Perron (F): 4 points in last 5 games (2 against Calgary)

by Mark Parkinson