The Calgary Flames beat the Detroit Red Wings by a 5-1 score on Thursday night at the Scotiabank Saddledome. Here are selected reactions from players and coaches following the game.

A better, but imperfect, game

The Flames continued a string of better games on Thursday, following in the footsteps of strong efforts against San Jose and Philadelphia. They were pretty effective in all areas of the game, though they weren’t perfect.
Flames head coach Bill Peters commented on his team’s improved play as a five-man unit:
Definitely in spurts, for sure. I didn’t think we were tight in the second. I thought we were fine in the first, fine in the third. And I think in the third it came down to us having the puck more, and that’s how we want to play. We want to hold on, we want to make plays. We want to be responsible with the puck. Sometimes the right play is to chip it in and go to establish the forecheck, but there’s also times we need to hold onto it and I thought we did a better job of that tonight. And I think we’ve done a better job our last three games, so that’s an encouraging sign.
Flames captain Mark Giordano noted following the game that he didn’t think his team was great in the second either, but that they dealt with Detroit’s speed well.

Two potential key injuries

The Flames ended their night short a pair of bodies from a pair of incidents.
Andrew Mangiapane’s night ended with 3:25 remaining in the second period, as he toppled over while turning to skate backwards near the boards in the offensive zone. He tripped backwards and crashed back (and back-of-head)-first into the boards. He finished his shift, but went down the tunnel and didn’t return.
Elias Lindholm left the game with 14:48 remaining in the third period, as he was hacked on the back of the leg by Detroit’s Darren Helm in retaliation for a Lindholm hit on Helm earlier in the shift. (For what it’s worth, Peters noted to the media how the duo had been battling since the face-off of that shift and chalked it up to competitiveness.)

Short bench in the third period

Without Mangiapane and Lindholm for the final 15 minutes of regulation, the Flames rolled with 10 forwards. As a result, the lines once things settled down at even strength looked something like this:
  • Tkachuk – Backlund – Frolik
  • Lucic – Ryan – Bennett
  • Gaudreau – Jankowski/Monahan – Czarnik