Welcome to the Game Day Fire Drill, for this, Calgary’s 64th game of the season on March 5, 2010.

If this was like four years ago I’d be okay with it. That was one of his career-best seasons. Ate up good second-pairing minutes, produced good second-pairing points. He had a strong all-around season in which he anchored the time Chris Pronger wasn’t on the ice for the Oil.

And I’m pretty sure that’s the last time Darryl Sutter saw him play, because golly he’s just crashed and burned in hilarious, Edmontonian fashion. That season, when Edmonton went to the Cup Finals, he matched his career high in points and scored a career-high eight goals. Then he only had 2-15-17. Then 7-9-16 (and a minus-14). Then 2-12-14. And this year?

Zero-seven-seven. Minus-19.

Unless he’s a British spy, I don’t feel entirely comfortable with having a professional hockey player on my team being associated with that number. Especially on a Calgary team that can’t score and.. oh my he’s on a pairing with Jay Bouwmeester tonight. Well that means he’s probably going to get a lot of minutes so, y’know, that’s no good.

I mean I expected the Flames to lose to a team like the Devils anyway, but with Steve Staios probably getting 22-plus minutes against either Kovalchuk or Parise’s line? Oh my that is going to get ugly.

 

The Calgary Flames (30-24-9 for 69 points. Tied for ninth in the West, third in the Northwest) and the New Jersey Devils (38-21-3 for 79 points. Third in the East, second in the Atlantic).

7 p.m. Mountain time and 9 p.m. Eastern time. All other time zones should save the day.

Pengrowth Saddledome, Calgary, Alberta.

Calgary is 15-15-3 at home this year, which is the third-worst home record in the West (only Edmonton and St. Louis outstrip the Flames). The Devils are 18-12-2 on the road, but only 5-4-1 against Western Conference teams.

Their sound organization — Lou Lamoriello is one hell of a general manager. Look at the guys on this team. Parise. Elias. Zajac. Rolston. Kovalchuk. Very good forwards. Martin. Greene. White. Very good defensemen. Brodeur. Very good goalie. Funny how that works out.

Ilya Kovalchuk — Speaking of Kovy, he’s been with New Jersey for seven games and he’s got 2-5-7 to show for it. I wonder what it’s like to have a big pickup/rental actually work out.

Marty Brodeur — He cost your country much against America in the Olympics. He cost America even more by not playing in the gold medal game. We can all hate Marty Turco.

Because the Steve Staios era is just beginning. Enjoy the game and take a bath with a toaster in the comments section.