Post-Game: Lapses in judgment extinguish Flames

The Calgary Flames returned to the ice at the Saddledome tonight for the first time since their ugly loss to the Edmonton Oilers. They were a lot better than they were against Edmonton, but they retained some of their frustrating tactics – particularly losing pucks at the offensive blueline. Despite some good looks, they dropped a 5-2 loss to the Philadelphia Flyers – representing the Flyers’ first win since mid-November.

The locals came out with a bit more pep in their step than they had early against Edmonton. They were generating many shots in the first, but didn’t generate too many great scoring chances in the early parts. That said, they opened the scoring as Troy Brouwer jumped on a rebound off a Curtis Lazar shot and beat Brian Elliott to make it 1-0. That lead lasted 61 seconds. An Andrew MacDonald shot through traffic was stopped, but the Flames couldn’t corral the loose puck and both Valtteri Filppula and Michael Raffl swiped at it – Filppula got credit – to make it 1-1. Shots were 14-8 Flames, scoring chances were 10-10.

The Flames had an early power play in the second period. They had a ton of good looks, but couldn’t get a goal. Right after the power play expired, Shayne Gostisbehere rifled a point shot (which was deflected by Scott Laughton). The shot clanged off the post, off Mike Smith’s back foot and trickled over the line to make it 2-1 Flyers. Michael Raffl then buried a one-timer feed from Jakub Voracek to make it 3-1. Michael Frolik then got nabbed for high-sticking – replays showed that MacDonald clipped his own teammate – and Wayne Simmonds was fed a nice tap-in pass from Sean Couturier to make it 4-1 just nine seconds into the man advantage. With the game very one-sided on the scoreboard, the Flames shuffled their lines a wee bit and it led to a goal; Sean Monahan roofed one past Elliott (with Garnet Hathaway screening him) to make it 4-2 late in the second. Shots were 21-7 Flames and scoring chances were 15-4 Flames.

But that was as close as things got. Laughton buried a loose puck in the slot after a Jordan Weal wrap-around chance was foiled to make it 5-2. Travis Hamonic got tossed for a match penalty due to a hit on Dale Weise and the Flames settled into penalty-killing mode for much of the rest of the game. Shots were 10-6 Flames and scoring chances were 5-3 Flames.

The Flames were sunk by three momentary lapses:

They played pretty well, but spent a lot of time on the perimeter and couldn’t get many good chances in the slot. Oh, and Brian Elliott was better than Laurent Brossoit was on Saturday, which really hurt their chances for a comeback.

Mark Jankowski had a ton of good chances and his line was constantly making things happen in the Flyers zone.

Three goals against in 71 seconds? Yikes.

Glen Gulutzan spoke to the media following the game and had this assessment of the hit: “We did and I’m pretty confident that it’ll be reversed, from his point of view it looked like Dale hurt his knee a little bit and that’s why he went off, and he did return. I’m sure the league will look at it.” (Weise returned to the bench, but didn’t hit the ice again for the remainder of the game.)

“I thought we had a good first. I thought we came out with some jump, we got the lead. And they got it back. I think it was the critical times of the goals. They got the 2-1 lead, then we got a call for a high-stick that wasn’t ours and we made a bit of a bad play on the penalty kill and then it’s 3-1 so you’re behind. I thought our effort was there and we skated, but it was one of those nights where we weren’t getting rewarded.” – Flames head coach Glen Gulutzan assessing his team’s performance.

“I’m confident completely with him. Look at the goals tonight and we can see certainly some rebounds and ricochets that can’t be stopped. The number’s the number and the goalie’s the goalie.” – Gulutzan on Mike Smith’s performance over the past few games.

The Flames (14-12-1) fly east tomorrow. They visit the Toronto Maple Leafs on Wednesday night.