POST GAME: Paquette In Boys

In what was a pretty entertaining game, the Flames simply ran out of magic against a far-superior Lightning team. The Lightning beat the Flames 5-2 though for the first two periods, the Flames were able to keep things relatively close. 

The wheels fell off in a nightmareish third period for the Flames who committed too many turnovers, allowed too many breakaways, and benched too many Sven Baertschis. 

Read all about it after the jump!

The Flames started this game with a lot of good energy and five minutes in, the Flames were out-shooting the Lightning 5-2. One of the most notable parts of the first few minutes was that the much-maligned Sven Baertschi had two or three pretty good shifts, one of which was a pretty good scoring chance off of a pass from Paul Byron. 

Diaz drew in to the lineup tonight for Smid after he had his head slammed into the ice against the Capitals. In the early going I thought Diaz looked quite good even with the difficult task of being paired with Engelland. Jooris had a very good first period since being moved up in the lineup at the expense of  David Jones.

Despite the good start, someone named Cedric Paquette scored his first NHL goal on a power-move towards the net with Bollig observing the whole thing and Engelland following his man behind the net for reasons I do not understand. Lightning up 1-0. 

The Lightning were able to push back after the Flames had a great start but after a defensive zone faceoff win, the hockey machine that is Brodano produced a pass to Hudler who snapped a wrister past Bishop to even the game at 1. 

The Flames ended the period tied at 1 after quite a good first. The Flames outshot the Bolts 12-9 after 20 minutes and were able to skate with the Lightning which was all Flames fans could have wanted out of a road period against a team as skilled as the Lightning.

The Flames did not get off to a good start in the second. Paquette scored his second of the game and his career on a bit of a softy on Hiller to put the Lightning up 2-1. Following that goal, things went from bad to worse. The Flames were granted their first power-play of the game and Kris Russell gift-wrapped a short-handed breakaway to Brian Boyle who banged home a goal after Hiller denied the breakaway attempt. 

However, off the ensuing faceoff, Sean Monahan whacked home his fourth goal of the season after Gaudreau fanned on a rebound from a Giordano point shot, 3-2 Lightning. 

Continuing a wild start to the second, each team received diving calls like ten seconds apart which was very strange to say the least. The net effect was more than a minute and a half of 4-on-4 somehow, which again didn’t make much sense as it seemed as though we were going to watch some extended 3-on-3. 

The game maintained a pretty good pace for the next few minutes of the second and both teams managed to hit posts and crossbars, keeping the game from turning into a barn-burner. The second ended with the Lightning up 3-2 even thought the Flames played a pretty good period overall. Shots were tied 22-22 after two.  

The third didn’t start very well either. Dennis Wideman committed a pretty rough giveaway to Nikita Kucherov who found a wide open Tyler Johnson who roofed it over Hiller to make it 4-2 for the Lightning 40 seconds into the period. Two consecutive periods where the Flames allowed a goal in the opening two minutes. 

Following the goal, the Flames managed some pretty good push back and earned a powerplay which had some pretty good looks but was unable to convert. The Flames also gave up three breakaways in three minutes, all of which Hiller stopped to keep the game reasonably close or this one could have become a laugher early in the third.

However, the Flames weren’t able to conjure up any more late-game heroics in the third period and the Lightning essentially skated them into the ground for the rest of the game. I think our buddy Jeremy summed up the third period pretty well:

The Lightning added an empty netter and finished the Flames off by a final score of 5-2. The Lightning outshot the Flames 33-31.

Sean Monahan had a great game, looking dangerous throughout the game especially in the second period and scoring the second goal for the Flames. Also, I thought Jooris had another good game after being moved up in the lineup. However, I am going to go with everybody’s favourite whipping-boy of late, Sven Baertschi. 

Unlike last game, where yours truly lamented his virtual absence from the proceedings, Baertschi began to look dangerous for the first time this season. Was he a dominant presence? Far from it. But tonight I saw some progress in Sven’s game. Hopefully he can continue to build on this performance. Sadly, Hartley did not agree with this assessment and stapled him to the pine for the third period. Sigh…

I suppose Setoguchi showed some signs of life in this game but I can’t tell if I was impressed just because my expectations are so, so, very low for him.

The Flames continue their tour of Florida with a game on Saturday night against the Florida Panthers. If the Flames want to hang around this season and make a go of it, they are going to need to win games like the ones on Saturday.