Flames Game Day 22: Hosting the Penguins (7pm MT, SN One)

It’s one more game before another road trip for the Calgary Flames (12-4-5, 29 points), as they host the Pittsburgh Penguins (10-7-4, 24 points) before headed out west for a few games. The Flames are coming off a close loss on Saturday night, and they face a Penguins squad that had a winning streak snapped over the weekend. Which club can bounce back and pick up a victory?

This game gets rolling at 7 p.m. MT. You can catch the action on Sportsnet One and Sportsnet 960 The Fan.

Yesterday’s lines via Daily Faceoff:

Gaudreau – Lindholm – Tkachuk
Coleman – Backlund – Mangiapane
Dube – Monahan – Pitlick
Lucic – Richardson – Lewis

Hanifin – Andersson
Kylington – Tanev
Zadorov – Gudbranson

Jacob Markström starts for the Flames, backed up by Dan Vladar. The projected extras are Michael Stone, Juuso Välimäki and Adam Ruzicka.

The Flames are coming off a 4-2 loss to Winnipeg on Saturday night, which gave them just their fourth regulation loss of the season – oddly enough, three of those four have come against Canadian teams. The Flames have been very good this season, but they played just poorly enough to lose on Saturday – their defensive zone transition game had some gaps in it. The Flames have tended to bounce back well this season, though.

Yesterday’s lines via Daily Faceoff:

Guentzel – Crosby – Rodrigues
Zucker – Carter – Kapanen
Aston-Reese – Blueger – McGinn
Heinen – Boyle – Simon

Dumoulin – Letang
Pettersson – Marino
Matheson – Ruhwedel

Tristan Jarry starts for the Penguins, backed up by Casey DeSmith. (Jarry was just named the NHL’s second star of the past week.) Their expected extras are Drew O’Connor, Sam Lafferty and Mark Friedman.

The Penguins played on Saturday night and lost 6-3 to Montreal, having their six game winning streak snapped. Despite their usual cap issues and their annual slew of injuries, they’re a team that finds ways to keep chugging along. Their defensive group is rock-solid, their forward group has decent depth, and they have a healthy Sidney Crosby anchoring their first line. They’re not a powerhouse, but they’re a very good hockey team.

The Flames are without Brett Ritchie.

The Penguins are without Evgeni Malkin and Bryan Rust.

A month back, the Flames visited PPG Paints Arena and beat the Penguins by a 4-0 score.

Your recommended Twitter follows for tonight’s contest:

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