Welcome to the 26th Game Day Fire Drill, for this, Calgary’s 74th game of the season on March 26, 2009.

Second half of a back-to-back you say!? OUTstanding!

I was just saying to myself, “Y’know, there hasn’t been a game in a while that I absolutely knew for sure that the Flames were going to get demolished by a team that they would, under normal circumstances, do fairly well against.” And then BAM! A road back-to-back. Perfect.

For those scoring at home, the Flames are 2-5-1 in the second game of back-to-backs this year, and one of those wins was in overtime, so they also gave up a loser point to a conference opponent (I believe it was Minnesota). Good thing Columbus has only been buzzsawing its way through the best teams in the league over the past two or three weeks, because otherwise I might almost feel like the Flames have a chance.

After the tough loss last night, this is the opposite of what the Flames need, at least as far as I’m concerned. They got positively punished physically, and now they had to pack up and trundle down to Columbus for tonight’s game, which starts less than 24 hours after the puck dropped in Pittsburgh.

Feelin’ great about that. Yessir.

The Calgary Flames (42-25-6 for 90 points. Third in the West, first in the Northwest) and the Columbus Blue Jackets (38-28-7 for 83 points. Sixth in the West, third in the Central).

5 p.m. Mountain time and 7 p.m. Eastern time. All other time zones should melt due to cuteness overload.

Nationwide Arena, Columbus, Ohio

Calgary is 18-16-2 away from home this year, and just last night dropped the first game of a back-to-back against Pittsburgh. The Beejes are an excellent 23-11-2 in Columbus and have won four of their last five at home.

They’re super hot right now — Columbus is 7-2-1 in their last 10, and it’s not like they’ve played chump teams either. Wins over Los Angeles, Detroit, Boston, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Chicago (again) and Florida. That’s pretty goddamn impressive. Odd note: The overtime loss was to Tampa, and the other losses were to Nashville and Detroit. They’re awful tough to beat.

It’s their first playoff series ever — Like ever ever. They’ve got to be feeling great to have pretty much locked up a spot just under a week ago and that confidence is going to be tough to deal with.

Calgary has them in the second half of a back-to-back — Awesome. That’s awesome.

Rick Nash — Showoff.

This has worked out so well in the past. Enjoy the game and talk about this sure-to-be-devestating soon-to-be-loss fellow in the comments section.