Playoff FGD: Do or die for Flames in Game 6 (8:30pm MT, SN/CBC)

Photo credit:Sergei Belski/USA Today Sports

3 years ago

It has all come to this, folks. The Calgary Flames will face the Dallas Stars in a pivotal Game 6 match-up. If the Flames win, they have a chance to advance with a Game 7 on Saturday. If they lose, their season is over. It’s a must-win, do or die game for the gentlemen in red. Can they rise to the challenge?

The puck drops for Game 6 at 8:30 p.m. MT on CBC and Sportsnet’s national feed (with Chris Cuthbert and Louie DeBrusk) and Sportsnet 960 The Fan (with Derek Wills and Peter Loubardias).

The Flames

Projected lines, via Daily Faceoff:

Gaudreau – Monahan – Lindholm
Mangiapane – Backlund – Rieder
Lucic – Bennett – Dube
Quine – Ryan – Rinaldo

Giordano – Brodie
Hanifin – Andersson
Forbort – Gustafsson

Cam Talbot starts for the Flames, backed up by David Rittich. Matthew Tkachuk will, once again, be a game-time decision. (He didn’t take warm-up in Games 3, 4 or 5, and interim coach Geoff Ward didn’t specify when asked on Wednesday if he’s skated at all.) The Flames extras in Game 5 were Mark Jankowski, Byron Froese, Buddy Robinson, Oliver Kylington, Michael Stone, Juuso Valimaki, Alexander Yelesin, Jon Gillies and Artyom Zagidulin. (Austin Czarnik remains unavailable.)

The Flames have been the second-best team in this series. Sorry, but it’s true. They’ve been on their heels, turning over pucks in the defensive and neutral zones quite a bit and relying on Talbot to bail ’em out. He’s been game, but they haven’t given him a ton of help aside from special teams.

In this series, only four Flames have multiple five-on-five points: Dillon Dube, Derek Forbort, Mark Giordano and TJ Brodie. The usual first line of Gaudreau, Monahan and Lindholm? They have combined for zero. If you want a reason why the Flames are on the verge of elimination, there it is. Can they turn it around in time to extend the Flames’ season by another 48 hours? We’ll find out tonight.

The Stars

Projected lines, via Daily Faceoff:

Benn – Seguin – Radulov
Janmark – Pavelski – Gurianov
Hintz- Dickinson- Perry
Comeau – Faksa – Cogliano

Lindell – Klingberg
Oleksiak – Heiskanen
Sekera – Fedun

Anton Khudobin starts, backed up by Jake Oettinger. The projected extras are Nick Caamano, Jason Robertson, Justin Dowling, Joel Hanley, Gavin Bayreuther, Thomas Harley, Ty Dellandrea, Joel Kirivanta and Landon Bow. Stephen Johns and Ben Bishop remain unfit to play.

Give Dallas credit: the Flames haven’t beaten themselves. The Stars have gotten timely goals and good goaltending, but they’ve also stuck with the program. They play smart, physical, structured hockey, and basically make the opposition have to battle to get to the front of the net. So far, that’s been enough to stay in games and rack up Ws. One more, and they punch their ticket to the second round (and a likely date with Colorado).

The Numbers

	Flames	Stars
Wins	5	4
Adjusted Corsi	46.1%	51.0%*
Power Play	28.1%	14.3%
Penalty Kill	86.1%	77.8%

*- The NHL’s shot data for the Dallas/St. Louis round robin game is hot garbage, so possession stats are only available for the other Dallas games.

Unfit to Play Report

The Flames are without D Travis Hamonic (opted out). F Matthew Tkachuk’s (probably a concussion) is a game time decision. F Austin Czarnik (family) has left the bubble.

The Stars are without D Stephen Johns and G Ben Bishop (unfit to play).

When Last We Met

This is Game 6 of a playoff series.

The Flames were great in Game 1, and won 3-2.
The Flames were not good in Game 2 and lost 5-4, tying the game late but blowing the tie with 39 seconds left in regulation.
The Flames were adequate in Game 3 and got amazing goaltending, winning 2-0.
The Flames were adequate in Game 4 and got good goaltending, losing 5-4 in overtime after blowing a lead with 12 seconds left in regulation.
The Flames were fine in Game 5, but their opening period stunk and they squandered a bunch of PP time. They lost 2-1.

Know Thy Enemy

Here are some key Twitter peeps to follow for tonight:

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