Top 40 Calgary Flames: #15 Sean Monahan

This coming May is the 40th anniversary of the Atlanta Flames moving to Calgary. To commemorate this occasion, we’re counting down the Top 40 Calgary Flames in history.

We’re getting into the upper echelon of Flames greats here. Coming in at #15 is Sean Monahan.

For the better part of Jarome Iginla’s entire tenure with the Flames, successive general managers spent considerable brainpower and resources trying to find the perfect center for him. It’s somewhat ironic that three months after trading Iginla to Pittsburgh, the Flames selected a player that could’ve been a great fit with Iginla in the form of Monahan.

A beef young gentleman, Monahan broke camp in 2013-14 with the Flames and has been a fixture in their top two lines for many seasons. He’s played seven seasons. He’s scored 20 or more goals in all seven seasons, including three where he broke the 30 goal plateau.

A gleefully stoic figure, Monahan has emerged as one of the most prolific scorers in club history. Hardly a distributor or a dynamic play-maker, Monahan has earned his living by going to the front of the net and battling for position. He’s scored many, many goals battling a defender, receiving a pass, and scoring from the slot or thereabouts.

Quietly, Monahan has played a lot of games and scored a lot of goals. He’s already 16th in games played, while ranking 13th in point, seventh in goals and fourth in game winning goals. He’s already the franchise leader in overtime winners, to boot. He’s received votes for the Calder, the Selke, and three times he got votes for the Lady Byng.

Is Monahan the best player in club history? Nope. In a franchise that had Joe Nieuwendyk for awhile, Monahan’s not even close to being their best-ever center. But as far as bonafide goal-scorers go, he’s already among the very best. He’s #15 on the list.

Top 40 Calgary Flames: HM Martin Gelinas | #40 Brad Marsh | #39 Matt Stajan | #38 Jiri Hudler | #37 Dion Phaneuf | #36 Guy Chouinard | #35 Phil Housley | #34 Matthew Tkachuk | #33 Cory Stillman | #32 Curtis Glencross | #31 Jamie Macoun | #30 Carey Wilson | #29 Reggie Lemelin | #28 TJ Brodie | #27 Alex Tanguay | #26 Daymond Langkow | #25 Sergei Makarov | #24 Craig Conroy | #23 Robert Reichel | #22 Paul Reinhart | #21 Doug Gilmour | #20 Mikael Backlund | #19 Jim Peplinski | #18 Joel Otto | #17 Tim Hunter | #16 Joe Mullen