After three days without a game, the Calgary Flames (21-25-6, 48 points) hit the road… for one game! They’re in the scenic Twin Cities where they face the Minnesota Wild (30-14-10, 70 points) on Thursday evening at Grand Casino Arena! Can the Flames shake off their 2026 funk and get back into the win column?

Today’s broadcast begins at 6 p.m. MT on Sportsnet West and Sportsnet 960 The Fan.

Projected lines via Daily Faceoff:

Connor Zary – Nazem Kadri – Martin Pospisil
Jonathan Huberdeau – Morgan Frost – Matvei Gridin
Yegor Sharangovich – Mikael Backlund – Matt Coronato
Joel Farabee – Justin Kirkland – Adam Klapka

Yan Kuznetsov – MacKenzie Weegar
Kevin Bahl – Zach Whitecloud
Joel Hanley – Hunter Brzustewicz

We’re projecting Devin Cooley to start in net, backed up by Dustin Wolf. The projected extra skaters are Brayden Pachal and Ryan Lomberg. It appears the Flames are making no significant changes, aside from continuing the goalie rotation.

The Flames are 3-7-2 in 2026, with offence being hard to come by. Mikael Backlund, Connor Zary and Yegor Sharangovich are in a three-way tie for the team’s scoring lead with seven points in 12 games so far this year. The Flames are winless in four games since Rasmus Andersson departed for Vegas, scoring just six goals in that span.

Projected lines via Daily Faceoff:

Kirill Kaprizov – Ryan Hartman – Mats Zuccarello
Marcus Johansson – Joel Eriksson Ek – Matt Boldy
Marcus Foligno – Danila Yurov – Vladimir Tarasenko
Yakov Trenin – Nico Sturm – Vinnie Hinostroza

Quinn Hughes – Brock Faber
Jacob Middleton – Jared Spurgeon
Daemon Hunt – David Jiricek

We’re projecting Filip Gustavsson to start in net, backed up by Jesper Wallstedt. Their projected extras are Tyler Pitlick and Matt Kiersted.

The Wild are 6-4-3 in 2026, and they’ve been pretty streaky lately. That said, they’re a team that flat-out knows how to generate offence. They have three players scoring at a point-per-game or better pace in 2026: Quinn Hughes (19 points), Kirill Kaprizov (17 points) and Mats Zuccarello (13 points). They’re not quite at the height of their powers, but they’re definitely starting to round into form as the Olympics loom.

The Flames are without Sam Honzek, Jake Bean, John Beecher, Zayne Parekh and Blake Coleman.

The Wild are without Zach Bogosian and Jonas Brodin.

This is the finale of the three game season series. The Flames and Wild have split the first two games: Minnesota won 2-0 at home in November, Calgary won 4-1 at home in December.

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