Flames Scoring Chances and post game – Game 56 vs Vancouver Canucks

 

 

 

Final Score: 3-2 SOW

 

 

Given how completely they were under manned and outshot, the Flames had themselves a pretty good evening. They were only outchanced by 6 at ES and 8 overall. That’s a bad game most nights, but the Flames lost Backlund half way through the second and spent the rest of the evening with all of one NHL-quality trio up front for the rest of the night. Pushing things to OT was a victory in itself, while gaining the extra point in the coin toss was icing on the cake.

The Flames were marginally the better team in the first period. They limited the Canucks to just two chances and the Backlund line managed to leverage a good shift to score Mike Cammalleri’s first ES goal of the season in Calgary colors. The second started out even better than the third – the Flames ran up five straight chances and extended the lead to two thanks to a Roman Horak effort at the side of the net.

Things got ulgy there after however. Andrew Alberts took a run at Blake Comeau in the neutral zone and ran him over. Mikael Backlund nudged him in response and Alberts took this as a sign to drop the gloves. He jumped on Backlund and they toppled over, hurting Backlund’s shoulder in the process. Alberts received four minutes in penalties as a result, but the damage was done. Roman Horak moved up to Backlund’s line for the rest of the game.

The Canucks took over after that. They outchanced the Flames 16-2 for the rest of regulation, but only managed to get two past Kiprusoff thanks to a couple of posts and highlight reel saves from the Flames netminder.

Vancouver was the only team to get meaningful shots on net in the OT, but Kipper stood tall again. Both Jokinen and Iginla managed to beat Luongo in the ensuing shootout, while only Burrows would tally for the Canucks. Alex Edler hit yet another post for Vancouver as well.

…The Flames won? They limited things as much as possible when Vancouver started pressing and Kipper was good when things broke down. Also, good ol’ fashioned luck – a bounce here or there and Calgary doesn’t make it past regulation.

Hard to pick anyone besides Kiprusoff. I’ll give it to the goalie and his right post, who also stopped at least three pucks tonight. How many times has a Flames goalie received this award recently?

This was thievery, plain and simple. Clagary shouldn’t have been in the game, but a solid first half and white knuckle second half plus some love from the hockey gods got them to extra time. Some nights you win when you probably shouldn’t and that was the case this evening.