24 hours after suffering a 4-1 loss to Tampa Bay, the Calgary Flames (17-9-6, 40 points) are back in action! This time they face the best team in the league in the form of the Carolina Hurricanes (23-7-1, 47 points), who lead the league in wins, points percentage, and are just overall a very good hockey club. Can the Flames finally get a win in their three team jaunt through the southeast’s trio of excellent teams?
This game gets going at 5 p.m. MT. You can catch the action on Sportsnet West and Sportsnet 960 The Fan.

The Flames

Projected lines via Daily Faceoff:
Gaudreau – Lindholm – Tkachuk
Coleman – Backlund – Ritchie
Dube – Monahan – Mangiapane
Lucic – Richardson – Lewis
Hanifin – Andersson
Kylington – Tanev
Zadorov – Gudbranson
It’s the second half of a back-to-back, so Jacob Markström will start with Dan Vladar backing up. Beyond that, we’ll see what changes there are from warm-up. Tyler Pitlick and Michael Stone were yesterday’s extras, while Adam Ruzicka and Byron Froese are on the taxi squad. Brad Richardson, booted from last night’s game due to a match penalty, won’t face any suspension and is available for tonight.
The Flames have lost back-to-back games by a combined score of 10-3. They had trouble with Florida’s speed and had trouble getting to the middle of the ice against Tampa Bay. Carolina is a structured, fast team, so it’ll be interesting to see how the Flames adjust to a team that’s almost a hybrid of the team clubs that just beat them.

The Hurricanes

Projected lines via Daily Faceoff:
Niederreiter – Aho – Teravainen
Svechnikov – Trocheck – Fast
Kotkaniemi – Staal – Necas
Lorentz – Stepan – Jarvis
Slavin – DeAngelo
Skjei – Pesce
Cole – Bear
Frederik Andersen starts for the ‘Canes, backed up by Antti Raanta. Jordan Martinook and Brendan Smith are their extra forwards, while Alex Lyon and Stefan Noesen are on their taxi squad.
What can we say about the Hurricanes? They’re good. Head coach Rod Brind’amour is a really good coach. They have depth all over their lineup. Their forward group is deep enough that Seth Jarvis can be sheltered in a fourth line role, yet is still able to contribute key minutes and fit very much in with the style they’re going for.
The Carolina Hurricanes are a very good hockey team.

The numbers

Calgary
Carolina
Wins
17
23
Points (%)
40 (.625)
47 (.758)
Adjusted Corsi For
55.7%
57.9%
Expected Goals For
53.3%
54.1%
Power Play
22.3%
23.7%
Penalty Kill
84.2%
89.5%

Unfit to play

The Flames are healthy.
The Hurricanes are without Jake Gardiner.

When last we met

The Flames were shut out by Carolina back in December 2019.

Know thy enemy

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