Friends, pre-season is hockey is generally something to be endured, not enjoyed. Sure, you get to see some players pull on a Calgary Flames jersey for the first time and test out how close they are to being fully-fledged National Hockey League players, but the quality of hockey can be variable.

When the NHL and the players’ association agreed to a new collective bargaining agreement, which kicks in this season, one of the things that was negotiated was a trade-off. The regular season will be expanded to 84 games starting this season, but the exhibition calendar has been trimmed back to just four games – and veterans of 100 or more NHL regular season games can play in a maximum of two.

The Flames announced their new, shortened 2026-27 pre-season calendar on Thursday morning. They will play a pair of home dates at the palatial Scotiabank Saddledome, hosting the Seattle Kraken on Sun., Sept. 20 and the Vancouver Canucks on Tues., Sept. 22 before heading on the road for games in Seattle on Thu., Sept. 24 and Edmonton on Sat., Sept. 26. The Sept. 22 game at the ‘Dome is anticipated to be the final NHL pre-season game ever held at the Saddledome.

Based on this scheduling, we’re expecting prospect training camp to open around Sept. 10 and main training camp to open around Sept. 17. While the Flames are not expected to be participating in any formal rookie tournaments this coming fall, it’s probably reasonable to expect that we will see some sort of rookie game(s), potentially against Edmonton as we’ve seen in recent years. With the shorter pre-season, we’re expecting a smaller main camp roster, so we’ll be very interested to see how the Flames coaching staff and management group balances getting younger players some developmental reps in camp with getting the more veteran players ready for the start of the NHL season.

The 2026-27 regular season is expected to begin around Sept. 29, with the schedule announced sometime in mid-July.