James Neal is a scorer, and has been throughout his career. He had 37 points as a rookie; his career high is 81. As a 30-year-old playing for Vegas in the 2017-18 season, he scored 44 points. And never, at any point in his time in the NHL, has he ever failed to hit the…
Two goalies with sub-.900 save percentages enter the rink. Two goalies… play well? And the rest of the Flames were, in theory, also there.
I think, after performances like that, it’s worth it to overhype some players, at least a little. Travis Hamonic had his best game as a Flame, and without David Rittich there wouldn’t have been a win. Full credit where credit is due, because those two were amazing – and they’re responsible for another two points.
Think back to the 2016 NHL Draft. The Flames, coming off of a very disappointing season, were in line to pick sixth overall. Though there were rumours that the pick may be traded for Ben Bishop, they ultimately ended up keeping it, making Matthew Tkachuk one of their highest picks in franchise history. It’s worked…
The Ducks’ starter has a save percentage of .933. Their backup, who the Flames faced Wednesday night, has a .936%! Two really good goalies. I wonder what that’s like.
During the offseason, the Flames made several moves in order to bolster their forward depth. One of the less heralded ones was the signing of Austin Czarnik, a 25-year-old with minimal NHL experience but extremely promising AHL results.
More often than not as of late, it’s the California teams that have sat atop the Pacific Division, and been among the toughest tests others have had to face. Though it’s early in the 2018-19 season, that hasn’t been the case so far: the Flames sit atop them all while the California teams have had…
As the Flames embark on a set of divisional road games through the state of California, Bill Peters has once again opted to introduce new-look lines.
Hockey Fights Cancer and Stick it to Cancer charities always feature prominently around the start of the season, but for the Stockton Heat and Adam Ollas-Mattsson in particular, it took on a whole other meaning.
It isn’t that the Flames are winning. It isn’t that they’re making third period comebacks. It’s that everything about them over this past week – some goaltending aside – has been consistently good. They can’t let their foot off the gas for even a moment, but they’re looking like a legitimately good team right now.
Good news: in their first seven-game segment, the Flames were 4-3-0. This time around, they’ve improved by one whole point, to 4-2-1. Featuring one of their worst losses in years (decades?), they still came away with a great record: and looked good most of the time, too.
It’s not how many goals you give up, it’s how many you score. Or something. That seems to be the philosophy the Flames are taking early this season, at least.
