The Calgary Flames played their fifth game of the 2026-27 regular season on Saturday, as they hosted the Anaheim Ducks at the Scotiabank Saddledome.

The Flames played a pretty good hockey game. They defended pretty well. They made some nice offensive plays and scored a couple very nice goals at even strength. They played smart. They played structured. They played physical.

They still lost.

An uneven third period undid a very strong first two periods for the Flames, as the Ducks scored a shorthanded goal and added a late insurance marker to hand the Flames a 4-2 loss.

“I thought the first forty was great,” said Flames forward Matt Coronato post-game. “I thought we were hard on pucks. We were moving our feet. And yeah, I think it’s just, it’s the same thing, but the full sixty is what you got to do to get the win.”

Coronato was impressive in the game, making smart passes to set up goals for Morgan Frost in the first period and Aydar Suniev in the second period. Suniev’s short-side snipe on Ducks netminder Ville Husso was his first-ever National Hockey League goal.

The difference-maker for the Flames was their special teams play. The Ducks opened the scoring on the power play, with Jackson Lacombe beating Dustin Wolf. In the third period, the game-winner was scored by Anaheim shorthanded, after a pass to the slot in the Ducks’ zone was intercepted by Ryan Poehling, who went in on an odd-man rush and scored shorthanded. (He also crashed into the net after being toppled by a sliding Zayne Parekh and didn’t return to the game.)

Flames head coach Ryan Huska evaluated the Flames’ third-period power plays after the game.

“I think when we had our first one, I think there’s a lot of people trying to make it happen on their own instead of just sticking with what they’ve done prior to power plays,” said Huska. “And then it kind of snowballed a little bit from there.”

The Flames played some good hockey on Saturday night, and offered some encouraging signs to the Saddledome faithful after a pair of clunkers to start the farewell season for the renowned building. But once again, they just weren’t able to convert good hockey into a victory.

“I think we definitely played a better game,” said Coronato. “The first forty, like I said, was really good, but we’ve got to get some wins. We’ve got to get our first win, so it’s about playing the full sixty, and we can take some good things for sure, but we’ve got to get on the right track here.”

“I think they know they played well tonight,” said Huska. “And we’re in a stretch where there’s some bounces that I feel that are going against us and some that are not going for us. Now, we didn’t earn those the first few games of the year. Lately, we’ve been playing better. So eventually, those are going to turn around for us and we’ll start seeing some results.”

The Flames get a rematch with the Ducks on Tuesday night in Anaheim as their next chance to get their first win of the season.