Postgame: It’s Over

 

 

I’m sure some people will be disappointed with the Flames’ 5-2 win today, as it drops them to 13th overall draft-wise; but I don’t care. It was nice to see them come out with a respectable effort in the team’s last game of the year.

The period started off well for the Flames, as Akim Aliu would get his first ever NHL goal courtesy of Luca Sbisa’s skate. The goal wrapped up a nice shift for Aliu, as he crushed Cam Fowler with a hit moments before his goal. Aliu would get in on the action again, as he lined up Fowler with another hit, creating quite the scrum in front of the Flames bench. Of note: Mike Cammalleri was right in the scrum. Love that guy. The end result would be a 4 minute power play for the Flames, but nothing would come of it. As the period was winding down, Henrik Karlsson made a pretty nice split leg save to keep the Flames up. Even though the Flames would generate 7 shots in the period, none of them would be counted as chances. The Ducks had 5 chances on 8 shots.

The second period was quite tepid until a strange sequence around the 11-minute mark: the Flames scored on the play, as Curtis Glencross buried a back-door shot-but Mark Giordano would get a “high-sticking” call for his skate hitting Andrew Cogliano in the face. The following few minutes could only be described as sublime-the Flames would take 3 more penalties, with two of those being iffy as well. As a result, Anaheim would tie the game up on the power play as Bobby Ryan would get his 30th past Karlsson at 13:33. The Flames would respond before the end of the period though, as Jay Bouwmeester would get his 5th of the season on a one-timer-and just 24 seconds later, Anton Babchuk would add to the total with his second of the year, also on a one-timer. The two teams would tie in the shot count with 9 apiece. The Ducks would win the chance count, 6-8.

Period Three was a real pressure cooker…ahah, ok, no. It was two teams that really didn’t care anymore playing an easy period. Aliu would get his second of the game just before the 8 minute mark on another lucky deflection-but as the old adage goes, they don’t say how-only how many. Lee Stempniak would pot his 14th of the season about 10 minutes later off of a nice pass from Blair Jones. Bobby Ryan would finish it off, making it a bit more respectable for the Ducks with 27 seconds left. 

1. Akim Aliu

2. Bobby Ryan

3. Henrik Karlsson

Not too much to say after this one except that we’re all done for this year. The post-mortems and analysis will come, but it’s nice to finish off the season on a winning note.