Ladislav Smid Joins Exclusive Club

Ladislav Smid dressed against New Jersey, suiting up for the Calgary Flames for the 13th time this season. He played 10:51 in a loss, but the game represented an interesting milestone for the Czech native.

It was Smid’s 100th game as a Calgary Flame. He became one of just seven players to play 100+ games on both sides of the Battle of Alberta. And oddly, very few of them were star players.

Here are the seven members of the 100-100 Club, as I’m calling it.

A legend of the Battle of Alberta, Steve Smith played 385 games with the Edmonton Oilers and won three Stanley Cups. But he’s also a big part of Flames lore, having played 102 games with the Flames after initially retiring from the game and serving as the team’s captain for a spell.

Oh, and he scored the series-clinching goal in the 1986 Smythe Division Final…on his own net.

A two-time Olympic gold medalist, Kravchuk played 160 games over four sasons (1992-96) with Edmonton and 115 games over two seasons (2000-02) with Calgary. He played with both teams during a period when both teams weren’t very good at all.

It only makes sense that a kid from North-Central Alberta would play for both of the province’s NHL teams. He played 303 games from 1993-99 with Edmonton and was a strong contributor, then landed in Calgary for two stints (2001-02 and 2003-04) which included the Flames trading him away and then reacquiring him but not being able to use him due to a quirk in waiver rules. He’s best remembered in Calgary as part of the vaunted MCI Line (McAmmond – Conroy – Iginla) that saw Iginla score 50 goals and win a scoring title.

Gelinas has a unique place in history, having gone to the Stanley Cup Final with both the Oilers and the Flames (winning with Edmonton in 1990 and losing with Calgary in 2004). For what it’s worth, he also went to the big dance with Vancouver in 1994. He played 258 games with Edmonton (1988-93) and 157 games with Calgary (2002-04), where he currently works as an assistant coach.

Renowned both for his physicality and his booming shot, “the Hammer” spent 196 games in Edmonton over three seasons (1997-2000) and 126 games in Calgary over two seasons (2005-07). The Oilers weren’t amazing during that time-span, but he was a good contributor on a Flames squad that won a division title with him on their roster.

A local favourite, Ference played five seasons and 224 games (2002-07) with Calgary as a strong complementary defender and signed a long-term contract to stick around. However, he was then traded to Boston (where he won a Stanley Cup, so it wasn’t all bad). He’s currently on the Edmonton Oilers roster where he’s played 147 games since 2013 and served as team captain and more recently as a frequent healthy scratch.

Smid was part of one of two trades between the Flames and the Oilers; he came to Calgary with minor-league goalie Olivier Roy in exchange for Roman Horak and Laurent Brossoit. (The other trade involved Steve Staios, so perhaps there’s a rule that Edmonton has to send the Flames depth defenders.) He’s played 474 games with Edmonton and 100 games with Calgary, but he’s most frequently been a healthy scratch this season (ala Ference).