Cam Talbot’s sharp play can’t steal points against Dallas
By Ryan Pike
4 years agoThe Calgary Flames were hoping to close out their homestand with a big win over the Dallas Stars. Thanks to an iffy second period, it didn’t quite work out that way, as the Flames lost 3-1.
The game swung on a couple key sequences:
- Sam Bennett’s offensive zone penalty early in the second period – in the wake of a Flames power play – which led to a Dallas power play goal to make it 1-0.
- A failed three-on-one rush in the third period which was followed by Justin Dowling’s first NHL goal for Dallas to make it 2-0, holding up as the eventual game-winner.
Following the game Flames head coach Bill Peters noted he hadn’t seen a replay of Bennett’s miscue, but he offered a general assessment.
“You’d rather not take a penalty when you’re in the O-zone.”
In regards to the second sequence, Peters was a bit more verbose:
That’s kind of the way it was for us. We had some looks early. [Mangiapane] had a look on the first shift, a real good forecheck. And then I thought [Andersson] was down the middle in the first period. And then first shift of the second we had the carry-over on the power play, [Tkachuk] was in on little the partial one coming in on the off wing. I thought we had some looks. I thought our second period we could’ve been better, obviously, but I definitely thought we had some looks. And then It’s 1-0 and instead of 1-1 it goes to 2-0 on the transition the other way on the play on the three-on-one.
Peters was very complimentary towards Cam Talbot’s efforts in net. Playing for just the second time in November, Talbot was very sharp. The two goals he gave up were a power play rebound and a really nice play by Dowling on a two-on-one rush defended by Travis Hamonic.
Everyone involved played the two-on-one as well as they seemingly could. Dowling just made a heck of a play.
“That’s exactly how I want Hammer to play that,” said Talbot. “I want the shooter and sometimes guys are gonna make a good move. He kinda faked the shot, made me bite, and then he didn’t have much room to slide that in. Sometimes in the NHL guys are going to make good plays like that. But unfortunately we had a three-on-one the other way and just didn’t bear down when we needed to and instead of being 1-1 it’s 2-0. That’s just the way hockey goes sometimes.”
Talbot’s record drops to 1-4-0 in five starts. That said, there’s a pretty big disparity in run support between Talbot and David Rittich. In five outings, Talbot has seen his team score an average of 1.60 goals per game. In 16 starts, Rittich has gotten 3.25 goals of support per game – that’s double what Talbot gets.
It’ll even out over time, but right now the Flames can’t buy a goal with Talbot between the pipes.
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