Calgary Flames Game Day 39: A matinee in Philadelphia (11am MT)

Riding a three-game winning streak and north of .500 for the first time in over two months, the Calgary Flames (17-16-5, 39 points) look to continue their strong play as they chug along on their road trip. They’ll try to stay in the win column when they visit the Philadelphia Flyers (19-13-6, 44 points) for a matinee, the first of a back-to-back set of weekend matinees for the gentlemen in red.

The broadcast begins at 11 a.m. MT on Sportsnet’s national feed and Sportsnet 960 The Fan. The Flames opened as -115 favourites against the Flyers on Betway.

Projected lines courtesy Daily Faceoff:

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

Hanifin – Tanev
Andersson – Weegar
Oesterle – DeSimone

We’re projecting Jacob Markstrom to start in net, backed up by Dan Vladar. (We’re operating under the impression that they’re splitting goalie starts across this back-to-back.) The projected extras look to be Walker Duehr and rookie Yan Kuznetsov. We’re expecting Dennis Gilbert to miss this game after suffering an injury late against Nashville, which means Jordan Oesterle slots back in.

The Flames have won three in a row and are 6-2-2 over their past 10 games. Dating back to Nov. 1, they’re 15-10-4. Are they a powerhouse? Nope. Are they terrible? Also nope. They’re pretty good! They 16th in points percentage league-wide since November began, and at present, that’s basically where they sit. They’re capable of playing toe-to-toe with any team in the league and, at worst, being a tough out.

We may still be figuring out what their upward potential could be.

Projected lines courtesy Daily Faceoff:

Farabee – Couturier – Konecny
Tippett – Laughton – Hathaway
Foerster – Poehling – Brink
Deslauriers – Gardner

York – Sanheim
Seeler – Walker
Zamula – Ristolainen
Staal

The Flyers have been rotating goalies for the last while. So we’re projecting Carter Hart to start, backed up by Samuel Ersson. Their extras last game were Morgan Frost and Cam Atkinson, as they went 11 forwards and seven defenders, but we’ll see how it goes.

The Flyers are a pretty interesting hockey club. They have talented young players up and down their roster. They have a demanding coaching that has a reputation for getting young players to the next level. And they have some veterans in key positions. But they’re also a bit leaky and inconsistent defensively, and the Flames ran their show at times in their previous meeting last week.

They’re not world-beaters, but they’re a challenging team to play against– especially on home ice.

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

The Flyers are without Noah Cates and Ryan Ellis.

This is the second and final game of their season series. The Flames won their first meeting last week.