Calgary Flames Game Day 14: A Saturday night date with the Senators (5pm MT)

Just 24 hours after a shootout loss in Toronto, the Calgary Flames (4-7-2, 10 points) are back in action to conclude this back-to-back set! On Saturday evening, they’re visiting the Ottawa Senators (5-7-0, 10 points), another sub-.500 team that’s trying to find some standings traction early in their season. Can the Flames finish off their back-to-back set positively and leave Ontario with two more points?

The broadcast begins at 5 p.m. MT on Sportsnet One and Sportsnet 960 The Fan. The Flames are +115 underdogs to beat the Senators on Betway.

Projected lines courtesy Daily Faceoff:

Huberdeau – Lindholm – Mangiapane
Zary – Kadri – Sharangovich
Pospisil – Backlund – Coleman
Greer – Ruzicka – Dube

Weegar – Andersson
Hanifin – Tanev
Zadorov – DeSimone

It’s the back half of a back-to-back so there’s no morning skate, so we have to make assumptions and educated guesses. We’re projecting Dustin Wolf to start, backed up by Dan Vladar. Dennis Gilbert and Walker Duehr were scratches on Friday, and potentially we could see one or both rotate in against Ottawa. We’ll find out at warm-up!

Now, the Flames are a team that’s prone to some ill-advised and ill-timed lapses, and that hurt them against an offensively potent Leafs team on Friday. But generally-speaking, the shape of their game at even strength is looking more and more coherent, and more and more like the team we thought they could be this season. They’re quietly now 2-0-1 in their last three outings, and they’ve looked pretty decent in their last four games or so. They need to keep getting results and cobbling together points.

Projected lines courtesy Daily Faceoff:

Tkachuk – Norris – Tarasenko
Joseph – Stützle – Giroux
Kubalik – Jarventie – Batherson
Kelly – Chartier – Highmore

Sanderson – Zub
Chychrun – Bernard-Docker
Brannstrom – Hamonic

We’re projecting Joonas Korpisalo to start, backed up by Anton Forsberg. (The Senators seem to be doing a goaltender rotation.) Zach MacEwen and Tyler Kleven appears to be their lone healthy extra skater. Erik Brannstrom returns after missing some time with a concussion.

The Senators are a team in flux. They have some really good players – Tkachuk, Sanderson, and others – but they’re just lacking a bit of mojo to their game right now. They lost 5-2 to Vancouver on Thursday, and they’ve lost three of their last four outings. They’ll be trying to right the ship against Calgary.

The Flames are without Oliver Kylington, Jakob Pelletier, Kevin Rooney and Jacob Markstrom.

The Senators are without Thomas Chabot, Ridly Greig and Mark Kastelic.

This is the first of two meetings between these teams this season. They’ll conclude their season series in Calgary in mid January.