Post-Game: Flames pass their do-over against Canucks

The Calgary Flames got their second crack at the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday night at the Scotiabank Saddledome. Despite falling behind three times in the game, the Flames kept battling back and a special teams outburst gave them a 7-4 victory in the home-opener.

The Flames opened the scoring 12 seconds into the game. Off a Canucks icing, Sean Monahan won the draw and TJ Brodie’s point shot was redirected by Elias Lindholm (for his first as a Flame) to make it 1-0.

The Canucks responded, though, as Noah Hanifin lost his stick in the Flames end, beginning a weird sequence where several Flames exchanged sticks. Amidst this chaos the Canucks had a few nice scoring chances, ending with Elias Pettersson with a tap-in of a Nikolai Goldobin pass to the slot to make it 1-1.

With the Flames on a man advantage Vancouver capitalized again: James Neal couldn’t snag a loose puck inside the Canucks zone, allowing Brandon Sutter to zoom in on a two-on-one against Brodie. Brodie played the pass, so Sutter shot it and beat Mike Smith five-hole to make it 2-1 for the visitors.

But the Flames answered back 30 seconds later, three seconds after their power play expired, as Mark Giordano’s wrister wobbled past Jacob Markstrom to make it 2-2.

Shot were 9-5 Flames and scoring chances 11-5 Flames.

Vancouver responded to the Flames’ late first period marker with an early goal in the second period on a man advantage. With Dalton Prout in the box, Smith made an initial toe save on a Vancouver chance but the rebound was booted out to Alex Edler at the point, who shuffled it to Pettersson for a no-doubt one-timer to make it 3-2 Vancouver.

The Flames finally broke their power play goose-egg off a weird sequence. Well, a couple of them. First, Matthew Tkachuk appeared to score on a goal-mouth scramble with Derek Ryan mucking around the crease area. The officials discussed it and allowed the goal, but Vancouver challenged on the basis of goalie interference and the goal was waved off by the Situation Room in Toronto. 61 seconds later, Sean Monahan’s initial shot on Markstrom was stopped but Gaudreau buried the rebound to make it a 3-3 deadlock.

But the Canucks responded (again) on the power play. With Giordano and Michael Stone in the box and the Canucks with a 44 second five-on-three advantage, Pettersson found Bo Horvat on Smith’s doorstep for an easy redirect to give the visitors a 4-3 lead.

Shots were 17-7 Flames and chances 11-4 Flames.

The Flames managed to even things up (again) in the third period on a power play. Gaudreau held onto the puck as his teammates got into position, skated deep into the zone, then found Monahan with a cross-zone pass for a top shelf redirect to make it 4-4.

A little bit later in the period, Goldobin took a penalty and Gaudreau this time found Lindholm with a cross-ice pass for a wrist shot goal – the third power play goal of the game – to give the Flames a 5-4 lead.

Austin Czarnik and Michael Frolik each added an empty netters to give the locals some breathing room (and a 7-4 victory). Shots were 11-8 Flames and chances were 5-3 Flames.

They won the special teams battle, with their three power play goals and (empty net) shorthanded goal surpassing Vancouver’s pair of power play markers and a shorthanded goal. When you win the special teams battle, and your even strength play isn’t awful, you’ll win a lot of hockey games.

But more importantly, the Flames showed some resiliency. We’ve seen plenty of examples in the recent past of the Flames getting a bad break – self-inflicted wounds or otherwise – and crumbling under the pressure. Tonight they kept battling until the Canucks couldn’t answer back.

Let’s go with Lindholm, who had a pair of goals (including the game-winner). But there are a lot of stick-taps to go around: five other Flames had multi-point nights, and Tkachuk had four assists.

Monahan’s game-tying goal midway through the third period really gave the Flames some life, and seemingly gave them the fuel to keep battling. The goals just started flowing from there.

Dillon Dube and Juuso Valimaki, playing their first game at home, didn’t hit the scoresheet but generally looked quite good.

D’Artagnan Joly had a goal in Baie-Comeau’s big 3-2 win over the powerhouse Halifax Mooseheads. In the AHL, the Stockton Heat led 2-0, 4-2 and 5-4, but ended up losing 6-5 in overtime to the Ontario Reign. Spencer Foo had two goals and an assist in the loss.

The Flames are off tomorrow, then hit the road to prepare for a game on Tuesday evening against the Nashville Predators down in Music City.