After splitting a back-to-back set on the road earlier in the week, the Calgary Flames (6-13-3, 15 points) are back at home… for one game, prior to heading out on a five game road trip. Their lone home game is against an old foe, the Dallas Stars (13-5-3, 29 points), the team the Flames hope to be when they conclude their retooling process. Can the Flames continue a good stretch of play and get a positive result before their long roadie?

Today’s broadcast begins at 8 p.m. MT on CBC, Sportsnet’s national feed, City TV and Sportsnet 960 The Fan.

Projected lines via Daily Faceoff:

Yegor Sharangovich – Nazem Kadri – Joel Farabee
Jonathan Huberdeau – Morgan Frost – Matt Coronato
Connor Zary – Mikael Backlund – Blake Coleman
John Beecher – Sam Morton – Adam Klapka

Yan Kuznetsov – MacKenzie Weegar
Kevin Bahl – Rasmus Andersson
Joel Hanley – Brayden Pachal

Based on an optional morning skate, Devin Cooley starts, backed up by Dustin Wolf. The projected extras look to be Jake Bean, Dryden Hunt and Ryan Lomberg.

Are the Flames in a good spot? Nope. They’re dead-last in the NHL, whether you rank by points or points percentage. Their playoff hopes and dreams are faint and fading rapidly. But they’re playing better lately and they’re 2-1-1 in their last four games. Heck, they’ve been good more often than not in the month of November. They’ll need to be at their best against Dallas.

The Flames have dug a hole for themselves. And yeah, it’ll be tough for them to get out of that hole. But there are some positives to be found in this season, here and there.

Projected lines via Daily Faceoff:

Jamie Benn – Wyatt Johnston – Mikko Rantanen
Jason Robertson – Roope Hintz – Tyler Seguin
Oskar Back – Justin Hryckowian – Mavrik Bourque
Sam Steel – Radka Faksa – Colin Blackwell

Esa Lindell – Miro Heiskanen
Kyle Capobianco – Vladislav Kolyachonok
Lian Bichsel – Alex Petrovic

Casey DeSmith is slated to start in net, backed up by Jake Oettinger. Their projected extra is Nathan Bastian.

So, y’know why the Flames are trying to follow the Dallas model? Because the Stars are really friggin’ good, and have been for awhile. They’ve won six of their last games games. They snapped a five game winning streak when they lost to the New York Islanders on Tuesday, then responded with a win against Vancouver on Thursday. They’re one of the top handful of teams in the league.

The Stars have four regulars scoring at a point-per-game pace or more: Mikko Rantanen, Jason Robertson, Wyatt Johnston and Roope Hintz. Miro Heiskanen is just shy of a point-per-game pace.

The Flames are without Martin Pospisil, Zayne Parekh and Sam Honzek.

The Stars are without Adam Erne, Ilya Lyubushkin, Nils Lundkvist, Matt Duchene and Thomas Harley.

This is the first meeting of three between the Flames and Stars this season. They meet again in Calgary on Mar. 3 and then in Dallas on Apr. 7.

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