POST GAME: HOW THE? WHAT THE? WE’LL TAKE IT!

Aside from that incontinence-inducing save, I don’t think this game will be used in many goaltending clinics in the near future that’s for sure. There were some weird goals tonight in a game where the Flames beat the Caps 4-3 in OT. 

The Flames won a game that I had thought they had lost at least on two different occasions thanks to an overtime goal from Sean Monahan. The Flames continue to win when people least expect them to and are now FOUR GAMES ABOVE .500 ARE YOU SERIOUS?! 

Come see how the Flames managed this after the jump!

There was a lot of anxiety about whether or not Gaudreau was going to play tonight as he missed the morning skate with the flu. If he wasn’t able to go, McGrattan would have taken his spot so needless to say everyone was pretty relieved when Gaudreau came out for the warmups. Gaudreau was used sparingly throughout the game but had some moments where he looked dangerous. Get better soon Johnny…

The caps, coming off of an ugly loss to the coyotes, started the game by dominating the Flames for the first half of the period. Even though the Caps controlled play, they weren’t able to generate any really good scoring chances and the Flames were able to make them pay. The fourth line of the Flames had a pretty good shift and Lance Bouma, who had just flown into his own bench on a comically bad attempt at a body check, cleaned up a Kris Russell point shot and put the Flames in front 1-0. 

However, that didn’t last long. 1:09 later. the Caps resumed controlling the play and Nicklas Backstrom tipped home an Ovechkin point shot and tied the game at 1. With that assist, Ovie became the all-time points leader in Caps history.

Unsurprisingly, Deryk Engelland was an adventure in the first, not exactly justifying the decision to swap him out for Diaz after the win over the Habs. All things considered, the Flames did a pretty good job of holding a clearly motivated Caps team to just one goal and few really good chances. 

The Caps outshot the Flames 13-10 after the first and generally controlled play well. The Flames possession stats were uh, not great through 1 (love the response to our buddy Mike’s tweet here):

The second started off mostly the same with the Caps controlling play and having a few good chances early on. One of the most noteworthy events of the early second was a particularly spirited bout between Engelland and Liam O’Brien. Both were throwing haymakers and Engelland landed a nasty uppercut. The fight seemingly came out of no where which was kinda weird but the youngster O’Brien showed some courage for taking on a much more experienced pugilist in Engelland, who may be bad at playing defense but can punch well (and has a great stache at the moment). 

Halfway through the second, Mark Giordano made a great move around Tom Wilson and shoveled a backhander past Holtby to put the Flames back in front 2-1. David Jones, who looked pretty good all game, made a nice play and chalked up an assist for his efforts. Mark Giordano is amazing and everyone should shave their heads in tribute to him.

Then, because we can’t have nice things, the Caps drew even 40 seconds later when Hiller managed to bat the puck into his own net. Meh, after what Hiller has given the Flames so far this season he is allowed a few of these.

After the Flames were already a man down from a Glencross roughing call (that began with a fairly nasty elbow from Ovechkin if you ask me) Wideman chucked a puck over the glass and the Caps went two men up. You can guess what happened next. Joel Ward put the Caps ahead 3-2 on a cross crease feed. Half of Ward’s goals this year have come against the friggen Flames if it seems like he is always scoring on the Flames. 

Brandon Bollig took an absolutely bone-headed hooking penalty at the end of the second period which the Flames were able to kill but I had to mention it because it was really dumb. The second ended with the Caps out-shooting the Flames 24-16. 

The Flames started the third listlessly and the Caps had two or three good chances in the first five minutes of the period. The Caps were able to slow things to a grinding halt for the majority of the third and take advantage of the lack of firepower from the Flames.

It all looked as though the Flames would be ground into dust in this one and then, outta nowhere, the hockey gods repay the Caps for their second goal by granting the Flames the equalizer which was credited to Markus Granlund but went in off of Troy Brouwer. You have to love the reaction of the Caps broadcast here:

The game really opened up towards the end of the game and then, as time was expiring, Jonas Hiller made an absolutely unbelievable save to get the game into overtime. It was crazy good. He is absolved of all wrongdoing on goal number two. 

The game headed to overtime which was crazy fun to watch. Matt Niskanen fell down which gave the Flames a 2 on 1 which saw Jooris feed Monahan to win the game. Here it is, praise be to Jooris for that play and Monahan for the finish.

Jonas Hiller should get consideration for battling through those bounces and making that unbelievable save with 1 second remaining and look, we could give this to Brodano every single game so I am going to go a bit off the board with this one. I liked David Jones this game and I think he’s been pretty good since returning from injury this season. Jones had an assist tonight and looked generally good on a night that the Flames didn’t exactly show much life offensively.

Monahan has looked great in the circle this season and obviously he gets some love for that OT winner and Jooris played really well again tonight. 

Sadly, Baertschi was invisible again tonight and I am not sure all of the blame can be laid at the feet of Setoguchi. At some point, he needs to show that he is capable of driving play forward and show his skill with the puck. In the third, Sven was benched by Hartley which obviously isn’t going to help the kid get his legs at the NHL level. Sorry to be a downer..

The Flames’ road record in an insanely good 6-2-0 which is amazing.The Flames continue their trip against Stamkos, Drouin, and like 400 more skilled Europeans on the Lightning on Thursday, 5:30 MT start.