Quips and Quotes: Flames beat Flyers 3-1

The Calgary Flames beat the Philadelphia Flyers by a 3-1 score on Tuesday night at the Scotiabank Saddledome. Here are selected reactions from players and coaches following the game.

Flames fans – at least those on Twitter – freaked out when Mikael Backlund blocked a shot in the third period. He had to be helped off the ice, but returned to the game late in the period. It was obviously a relief to the coaching staff and players that Backlund was able to return.

“I’ll breathe easier in the morning once we get him in here tomorrow and see how that reacts overnight,” said head coach Bill Peters. “I don’t know exactly where he took it, but it was heavy and he was in quite a bit of discomfort there, obviously. And credit for him to come back and play. But those ones we’ll see in the next 12, maybe 18 hours. Hopefully we dodged a bullet.”

Flames netminder David Rittich didn’t get the shutout, but he got his third win this season. He allowed just the one goal – off a series of poor decisions by the Flames on the back-check – but otherwise sparkled. He made several showy saves and held the Flames in the game at times.

“He’s been good,” said Peters. “He’s been dialed in right from his first preseason game. That hasn’t changed at all. We’ll continue to work on everything that we need to work on, tighten up a little bit in the defensive zone and the goalie-D exchange and that’ll make us even better.”

Peters chuckled when asked about Rittich’s attempt at scoring on the empty net late in the game, asking reporters what the score was (rhetorically) and then noting that they’d talk to Rittich about when to attempt those types of plays.

The Flames won just 36% of their face-offs against the Flyers, with Derek Ryan (50%) the only regular center who wasn’t underwater percentage-wise. Backlund (7%), Monahan (47%), Lindholm (45%) and Jankowski (38%) all took a beating.

But Peters gave the opponent credit where it was due, tipping his cap to the Flyers and their elite top duo of Sean Couturier and Claude Giroux.