Flames won first 3 against the Oilers. I think they were bound to lose one eventually. Then they did, with shenanigans to spare! Was this a case to be concerned about one loss, or was this more old timey hockey (we’re going to make sure even if you beat us, it was a war)?
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FlamesNation mailbag: battle aftermath
What a few weeks it has been. We’ve seen body checks, suspensions, line brawls, and goalie fights – and that’s just the Battle of Alberta games! With a mere 29 games to go, every single contest will be huge from here on out.
Let’s check the mailbag.
On one hand, it’s one loss. The Flames were never going to with their 30 remaining games.
On the other hand, interim head coach Geoff Ward seemed most perturbed post-game about how they lost. The coaching staff has been adamant about taking care of their own zone since the coaching change, making a few systems tweaks to emphasize tight coverage of the home plate area and “Royal Road” in front of the net. And facing a division rival for the third time in a few weeks, they completely abandoned the plan and looked utterly lost in their own zone for the first period and giant chunks of the second.
There have been games where they have lost their composure or ran out of gas. It happens over a long season. But they seemed to forget their game plan and forced their goalies to bear the brunt of things. That was probably what hurt the most.
How the heck do the Flames lose 8-3 (at home, even) to an equally-ranked team at this stage of the play-off race? Shades of dropping 4/5 games when they really mattered to Colorado last spring.🤢
Losing a game to a divisional rival stings, especially at home where they had last change. Simply put, they sucked defensively. It was probably their worst defensive outing of the entire season, allowing the top two scorers in the league to run roughshod at times. Heck, the coach and several players said as much.
It’s one game. But it’s also representative of the general inconsistency they’ve exhibited for basically this entire season. So how do they lose 8-3? Via the general inconsistency that’s seemingly part of the DNA of the team.
Is there reason to suspect a big move/trade come the offseason if CGY has another disappointing playoff result?
Yes.
Treliving has made big moves in every summer since he got the GM job:
- 2015: Dougie Hamilton
- 2016: Brian Elliott
- 2017: Travis Hamonic and Mike Smith
- 2018: Elias Lindholm and Noah Hanifin
2019 was a weird summer with the smaller-than-expected salary cap jump, but Treliving’s big swing was only felled by Nazem Kadri blocking a trade to Calgary. (And we still saw the Milan Lucic trade.) Expect a big move this summer, especially given the team’s lack of progress.
Who of the current UFA's to be on the Flames could/should the team be interested in bringing back?
The Flames have 10 pending UFAs between their NHL and AHL rosters: goalie Cam Talbot, defenders TJ Brodie, Travis Hamonic, Michael Stone and Brandon Davidson, and forwards Buddy Robinson, Tobias Rieder, Zac Rinaldo, Austin Czarnik and Alan Quine.
If the price is right, it would make a lot of sense to bring back Talbot, Stone, Davidson, Rieder, Czarnik and Quine. Talbot’s been a superb second goalie. Davidson has been excellent as an blueline anchor in Stockton. Stone has been a very useful seventh defender. And Rieder, Czarnik and Quine are perfectly useful depth forwards. Robinson is also working his way into “why not keep him?” territory.
Is it time to start worrying about Noah Hanifin? Coming from a big fan of his game, hes been awful with Hamonic this year. What is the likelyhood of a bounce back for him and him becoming (somewhat) like he was projected at the time of his draft?
Two caveats. One: development isn’t linear. Two: Hanifin just tuned 23 years old and he’s already played 372 NHL games. That’s a lot of hockey, he plays a lot of minutes, and mistakes will be made.
That said, mistakes have been made.
Hanifin is the raw stats basement for every defensive shot metric – nobody has allowed more shot attempts, shots, goals, scoring chances or high danger chances on the entire. When you scale that for his time on ice, he’s still in the bottom quarter to bottom third of every defensive metric. The whole team’s struggled defensively, but the hope was Hanifin would take a step forward – and he hasn’t.
Again, development isn’t linear. Maybe he bounces back next season. Or maybe he doesn’t and he turns out to merely be a rock-solid second pairing defender. The team’s hope is likely that one of their young lefties – Hanifin or Juuso Valimaki or Oliver Kylington – develops into a bonafide top pairing guy the way Rasmus Andersson is trending on the right side. If not, then somebody’s going to be playing over their head when Mark Giordano inevitably retires.
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