Calgary Flames Game Day 53: A clash at Madison Square Garden (5pm MT)

After a week on the east coast, it’s almost time for the Calgary Flames (25-22-5, 55 points) to head back home. But they’re closing out their four game road trip with a clash in historic Madison Square Garden against the New York Rangers (33-16-3, 69 points). The Flames have won four in a row, and could push their streak to five for the first time this season! But the Rangers are pretty good themselves, so this should be a pretty good hockey game.

The broadcast begins at 5 p.m. MT on Sportsnet’s national feed and Sportsnet 960 The Fan. The Flames opened as +130 underdogs against the Rangers on Betway.

Projected lines courtesy Daily Faceoff:

Huberdeau – Sharangovich – Kuzmenko
Zary – Kadri – Pospisil
Mangiapane – Backlund – Coleman
Pelletier – Rooney – Duehr

Hanifin – Tanev
Weegar – Andersson
Kylington – Pachal

We’re projecting Jacob Markstrom to start in net, backed up by Dustin Wolf. The projected extras are Jordan Oesterle, Dennis Gilbert and Cole Schwindt. We’re not expecting any lineup changes for a group that’s won three consecutive games coming out of the All-Star break (and four dating back to before the break).

The Flames have played three pretty good games on this road trip, with their win over Boston being perhaps their best game of the season in terms of playing their style of game and maintaining it for 60 minutes. They played about 50 strong minutes against the Islanders on Saturday. While the Rangers are, quite simply, a good hockey team, another 60 minute effort like we saw in Boston could send the Flames home with a supremely good road trip under their belts.

The Flames are three point behind St. Louis for the final Western Conference playoff spot, but the Blues have one game in hand. (When you control for games played, they’re really 3.2 points behind the Blues.)

Projected lines courtesy Daily Faceoff:

We’re projecting Igor Shesterkin to start in net, backed up by Jonathan Quick. The expected extra skaters are Zachary Jones, Tyler Pitlick and Matt Rempe.

The Rangers have won three in a row dating back to the All-Star break and, like the Flames, they’ve won four consecutively overall. But their wins have been a bit more dramatic than Calgary’s recently, with a pair of overtime wins over Chicago and Colorado… along with a 7-2 clobbering of the Senators before the break.

The Rangers are winning games, but you get the impression from watching recent media chats with head coach Peter Laviolette that he’s not quite satisfied, and that they’re not playing as well as he thinks they could be. For a team that seems like a playoff shoo-in – they enter Monday 15 points up on the ninth-place Islanders in the East – that attitude bodes well for a long run in the spring for the Blueshirts.

The Flames are without Dillon Dube, A.J. Greer and Dan Vladar.

The Rangers are without Filip Chytil.

This is the second and final meeting between these teams this season. The Rangers won back in Calgary way back in October.