Flames crash back to .500 after rough third period

The Calgary Flames lost on Sunday night in Las Vegas by a 3-0 score. The team continued their rough stretch, losing their fourth game in a row and third consecutive regulation contest. The loss dropped them to the .500 mark with a 10-10-3 record.

Flames head coach Bill Peters provided a fairly on-the-nose rundown of the game, linking the team’s rough third period to running with four defensemen after Travis Hamonic and Oliver Kylington left the game.

“I thought we battled through 40 and then had a tough one in the final 20,” said Peters. “I thought [Vegas] did a good job. When we went down in D, we went down in the second. [Hamonic] with a lower body and then we lost [Kylington] to concussion protocol, we got him back real late. About four minutes left when he came back. So I thought those four D, I thought [Vegas] did a good job of putting pucks in behind them and making them turn and then wearing them out.”

There were some interesting patterns in player usage in that bizarre third period. Typically, Peters parks his fourth line in the third period of games the Flames are losing.

So… he all but benched the top line. If that doesn’t send a message, I don’t know what does.

The Flames were shut out for the second game in a row, and actually are in the midst of a span of 130:03 without a goal dating back to the third period of their game with Dallas last Wednesday. that’s 73 shots without the red light going on.

Peters noted that “it feels like it’s hard to get it to go in right now.” But after 73 shots, pucks are bound to go in. Eventually.

The Flames’ 23rd game last season was a 2-0 loss in Vegas to the Golden Knights, dropping the Flames to 13-9-1. This season’s 23rd game was a 6-0 loss in the same building against the same team, dropping the Flames to 10-10-3. They’re definitively behind last year’s pace, but not spectacularly so.

The season is still salvageable.