Calgary Puck

Mike Smith put it well; “It’s nice to play a meaningful game”, when he spoke to HNIC after turning aside an Oiler assault to pick up a 3-2 win on Saturday night.

Take from a guy writing game stories, … ditto. It’s nice to have something to write about.

This one wasn’t a Picasso from the Flames perspective. They turned a brutal start into a red hot first period and then pretty much sat on it, relying on Mike Smith to steer the game home and snap a seven game losings streak.

And back to back wins over the Oilers. In a season without a whole lot of happiness you have to hang your hat on something!

– Full Article –

Not sure what else I can say.

We’ve written this script over and over again in the last two weeks with the injury depleted Flames limping towards the finish line in a season that won’t come soon enough.

The crew out shot and out chanced their opposition, but the exemplary goaltending by Sergei Bobrovsky and the iffy goaltending by Jon Gillies turned what could have been a tight game into a 5-1 triumph by the Jackets.

The Flames have now lost six in a row as they can’t find that April 7th gun shot soon enough.

– Full Article –

I suppose it would have been foolish to expect anything different.

The Calgary Flames haven’t done a great job of scoring goals of late, but take the top three forwards out of their lineup and add in the knowledge that they’re playing for next year and it would be hard to imagine a back and forth game of fire wagon hockey in Los Angeles tonight.

We didn’t. And it wasn’t.

The Kings scored two second period goals, and added a third in the third; all on the powerplay to push aside the Flames by a score of 3-0 on Monday night.

The Flames had gumption. They played physical. Their effort couldn’t be denied. But they just don’t have the horses to push back.
– Full Article –

Well at least the games don’t matter anymore.

The Flames don’t have the urgency or need for the two points, nor do they have three of their better players out with injury, but one thing of late hasn’t changed; the Flames continue to put everything on the net, out shoot their opponents, but give up too many grade A chances in getting blown out by three or more goals.

This time an afternoon game in San Jose where they give up two quick goals, get back in it, but then two more in the third in dropping a 5-1 decision to the Sharks pushing their losing streak to five games.

– Full Article –

We’ve seen this script often lately.

Fragile.

The San Jose game, the Vegas game, the Arizona game, and now the Ducks game.

Fragile.

Calgary throws lots of pucks on net, has a slight edge in scoring chances but can’t score and sees their goaltending lit up on pretty much every chance they surrender.

It’s not the play of champions, and this year it’s certainly not the play of a playoff team, its hard work and not much else these days.

Tonight the Flames essentially sealed their own fate, dropping a 3-0 game to the Ducks on Saddledome ice, with seven games left to go and a seven game win streak only resulting in 94 points I think that’s all she wrote.

– Full Article –