Looking back on the Flames’ lengthy road trip
By Ryan Pike
4 years agoNine days ago, the Calgary Flames left home hoping to find their mojo and stay in the Western Conference playoff picture. They played five road games, most of them good performances, and largely succeeded in their quest.
The Flames’ trip unfolded like this:
- 4-2 victory in Detroit – never trailed
- 5-2 victory in Boston – never trailed
- 4-3 overtime loss in Nashville – back and forth game
- 4-3 regulation loss in Tampa Bay – never led
- 3-0 victory in Florida – never trailed
All in all, that’s three strong games where they never chased, one game where it was back and forth, and one game where they chased the entire time. The fact is their weakest effort was in Tampa, and they still nearly tied everything up. On the aggregate, it was a great trip.
Nine of the team’s 21 skaters who played had a goal. They out-scored their opponents 13-5 at five on five. Their special teams was less good – combined they were out-scored 4-3 – but their even strength play was effective enough that it didn’t really matter. (Tampa was the only game really tilted by their special teams gaffes.)
How about individual performances?
Forwards
| Andrew Mangiapane 4 G / 0 A | Mikael Backlund 3 G / 5 A | Matthew Tkachuk 1 G / 4 A |
| Johnny Gaudreau 2 G / 3A | Sean Monahan 4 G / 1 A | Elias Lindholm 1 G / 3 A |
| Milan Lucic 1 G/ 0 A | Derek Ryan 0 G / 1 A | Dillon Dube 0 G / 0 A |
| Sam Bennett 0 G / 0 A | Mark Jankowski 0 G / 0 A | Tobias Rieder 0 G / 0 A |
The good? The top six is awake and scoring many goals. Everybody in the top two lines were good. The bottom six? Well, they were less good with one goal – combined.
Defense
| Mark Giordano 0 G / 3 A (3 GP) | TJ Brodie 1 G / 0 A |
| Noah Hanifin 0 G / 3 A | Rasmus Andersson 1 G / 1 A |
| Derek Forbort 0 G / 0 A (3 GP) | Erik Gustafsson 0 G / 2 A (3 GP) |
| Oliver Kylington 0 G / 0 A (1 GP) | Michael Stone 0 G / 1 A (2 GP) |
| Alexander Yelesin 0 G / 0 A (1 GP) |
Two goals from the blueline isn’t ideal, but it’s heartening that almost everybody got points because it means their passes from the point are turning into goals with encouraging frequency.
Goalies
In goal, David Rittich started four out of five games – he went 2-1-1 with a .906 save percentage and 3.02 goals against average. Cam Talbot started once and had a shutout win.
Maybe we’ll see a bit more of Talbot going forward, because his box-cars (save percentage and goals against average) are better than Rittich’s overall this season.
All-in-all? Aside from their shoddy special teams efforts, the five game trek out east did a lot to set the tone for the remainder of the season and provide a template for how their game needs to look if they wish to play more than 82 games this season.
Recent articles from Ryan Pike
