Historically, the Flames have struggled in elimination games

On Friday night, the Calgary Flames have an opportunity to do something they’ve only done four times since they won the Stanley Cup in 1989. They can win a playoff round.

Game 6 against the Dallas Stars is the 18th attempt the Flames will have to win the fourth and deciding game of a series. Historically, these games haven’t gone amazingly well for the club.

Since Brad Treliving became general manager in 2014, the Flames have been in a position to advance in a series once. They were successful, but they required two kicks at the can, going 1-1 in potential elimination games.

In 2015 against Vancouver, the Flames went into Game 5 with a chance to advance. They were out-shot 43-21 by a desperate Canucks team and lost a nail-biter by a 2-1 score. A couple days later, the Flames got down to a 3-0 deficit in the first period – starting goaltender Jonas Hiller was chased – but the Flames rallied back to tie the game 3-3, then pushed ahead and won 7-4.

When Darryl Sutter was general manger (between 2003 and 2010), the Flames had six series where they could have advanced – or in one case, they could’ve had a parade. The Flames were successful in half of those series, going 3-6 in potential elimination games.

Obviously, most of these opportunities were in 2004. They needed two attempts to get past Vancouver in the first round, losing 5-4 in triple overtime in Game 6 and then winning a nail-biter in Game 7 in overtime by a 3-2 score. The next two rounds saw the Flames being more efficient, beating Detroit in their first attempt (a 1-0 overtime win in Game 6) and San Jose in their first attempt (a 3-1 win in Game 6) to advance to the Stanley Cup Final. (Martin Gelinas had the series-deciding goals in each of the first three rounds.) The Flames ran out of steam, though, losing to Tampa Bay 3-2 in double overtime in Game 6 and then losing another tight game by a 2-1 score in the deciding Game 7.

In 2006, the Flames made two attempts to eliminate Anaheim in the first round but neither were successful. They were out-shot 32-22 in Game 6, with the Ducks scoring late in the second period to get a 2-0 lead and then clogging the neutral zone for the rest of the game. In Game 7, they lost a tight 2-1 game via a Ducks power play goal with six minutes remaining in regulation.

In 2008, the Flames forced a Game 7 against San Jose but seemed to run out of gas. They had 2-1 lead early in the second period, but then they gave up four goals before the end of the period and couldn’t climb back into it. They were out-shot 41-22 in the deciding game.

The Flames regularly made the playoffs under Doug Risebrough’s watch. But they simply couldn’t close out a series, going 0-6 in potential elimination games in three different series.

In 1991, the most recent Battle of Alberta in the playoffs, the Flames forced a Game 7 via Theo Fleury’s dramatic overtime winner in Game 6. Unfortunately, that game was followed by an equally dramatic Edmonton 5-4 win in overtime in Game 7.

In 1994, the Flames had three chances to eliminate the Canucks. Three times, they lost in overtime – off goals from Geoff Courtnall (Game 5), Trevor Linden (Game 6) and Pavel Bure (Game 7, double overtime) – to end up eliminated themselves.

In 1995, the Flames had two chances to eliminate the Sharks. They lost 5-3 in Game 6, then were eliminated via a 5-4 double overtime loss in Game 7 after a goal from Ray Whitney.

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