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Flames Draw Even In Game 2 Faceoffs

By Ryan Pike

Apr 19, 2015, 13:00 EDTUpdated:

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Once again in Game 2, the Flames won the Corsi battle but gave up an early goal. They lost Game 2, but did show some minor improvements at the face-off circle from the previous game.

But they still need to win more draws. A lot more.

GAME 2

	Sean Monahan	Mikael Backlund	Matt Stajan	Markus Granlund
Henrik Sedin	7 taken 4-3 VAN	2 taken 1-1 tie	4 taken 3-1 VAN	1 taken 1-0 VAN
Nick Bonino	5 taken 3-2 CGY	4 taken 4-0 CGY	2 taken 2-0 CGY	3 taken 3-0 CGY
Bo Horvat	3 taken 2-1 VAN	1 taken 1-0 VAN	2 taken 1-1 tie	1 taken 1-0 VAN
Brad Richardson	3 taken 2-1 VAN	1 taken 1-0 CGY	1 taken 1-0 CGY	n/a

WHOLE SERIES

	Sean Monahan	Mikael Backlund	Matt Stajan	Markus Granlund
Henrik Sedin	12 taken 9-3 VAN	9 taken 8-1 VAN	8 taken 6-2 VAN	2 taken 2-0 VAN
Nick Bonino	7 taken 5-3 CGY	6 taken 6-0 CGY	7 taken 5-2 CGY	3 taken 3-0 CGY
Bo Horvat	6 taken 4-2 VAN	4 taken 3-1 CGY	3 taken 2-1 CGY	3 taken 2-1 CGY
Brad Richardson	5taken 4-1 VAN	3 taken 2-1 CGY	5 taken 4-1 CGY	2 taken 2-0 VAN

In Game 2, the Flames won 6 head-to-head face-off battles, were even in 2 more, and lost 7 outright. Compared to their Game 1 performance, which saw them win 47% of the draws on the night, that’s a marginal improvement.

Monahan improved somewhat, but still lost three of four match-ups, only beating the TERRIBLE Nick Bonino, who is just awful at face-offs this series. Mikael Backlund was about even in terms of his match-ups and is ahead of the game series-wide. Stajan is in the same about, while Granlund isn’t great right now, but series-wide is about even.

Everyone beats Nick Bonino. Everyone loses to Henrik Sedin. I don’t know if this will factor into line matches, or if the coaching staff merely tries to focus on line-wide match-ups rather than specific face-off situations. But the Flames need someone to start dominating if they want to have a hot-hand option for specific face-offs late in games.