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Instant Reaction: The house always wins as Flames fall in Vegas
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Photo credit: Stephen R. Sylvanie-Imagn Images
Ryan Pike
Apr 3, 2026, 01:16 EDT
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Welcome to Instant Reaction, where we give you our instant reaction to tonight’s Calgary Flames game and ask our readers to do the same in the comments section below! 
The Calgary Flames headed to the Vegas Strip on Thursday night, hoping to have a better showing against the Vegas Golden Knights than they had against the Colorado Avalanche on Monday evening. The good news is they were a lot better than on Monday, and led for a good portion of Thursday’s game. Unfortunately, they faded a bit as the game wore on.
The Flames allowed a pair of third period goals and lost to the Golden Knights by a 6-3 score.

The rundown

The Flames took a pair of penalties early in this game, and Vegas generated six shots on net – and a few very good chances – but Dustin Wolf was very sharp.
7:41 into the first period, though, the Flames opened the scoring. Morgan Frost yoinked the puck in the neutral zone and headed in on an odd-man rush. He called his own number, beating Carter Hart low glove-side to give the Flames a 1-0 lead.
First period shots were 14-8 Golden Knights.
The second period was pretty action-packed in terms of goals.
1:47 into the second, Vegas tied things up. The Golden Knights funnelled the puck to the point, and a Shea Theodore point shot was deflected by Mitch Marner past Wolf to make it a 1-1 game.
Just shy of three minutes later, though, the Flames retook the lead. Joel Farabee made a smart play at the defensive blueline to break the puck out of the Calgary end, sending Mikael Backlund in on an odd-man rush with Blake Coleman. Backlund fed Coleman, and Coleman beat Hart stick-side to give the Flames a 2-1 lead.
About two minutes later, though, some nice puck movement in the attacking zone by Vegas tied the game once more. This time, a pinching Rasmus Andersson made a nifty little pass to Marner, who redirected the puck past Wolf to make it 2-2.
But later still, the Flames got the lead back. Vegas won an offensive zone draw back to the point, but Coleman poked the puck past Andersson at the point, then raced into the Vegas end, beating Hart glove-side to make it 3-2 Flames.
But later even still, Adam Klapka was called for boarding on a late hit – part of a sequence of escalating hits along the wall – and Pavel Dorofeyev blasted a one-timer feed from Marner past Wolf on the resulting power play to tie the game at 3-3.
Second period shots were 14-11 Golden Knights.
There was a 46 minute second intermission, rather than the standard 18 minutes, due to some ice repairs around an in-ice logo that was damaged by the zamboni during resurfacing.
12:20 into the third period, after a fairly even frame to that point, Vegas took their first lead of the game. Shea Theodore took advantage of a fallen Flames player to join the rush on an initial zone entry into the Calgary end. Brett Howden entered the zone unmarked as the trailing man, receiving a pass from Theodore and then taking advantage of some space in the high slot to beat Wolf with a wrister. That gave Vegas a 4-3 lead.
2:59 later, the Golden Knights tipped the puck onto the Flames zone off a dump-in. Wolf went to play the puck, seemed to lose his handle on it and he scrambled back into his crease. Marner got the loose puck, threw it on net at Wolf, and Ivan Barbashev jammed in the loose rebound to give Vegas a 5-3 lead.
The Flames pulled Wolf for the extra attacker late, but couldn’t muster another goal.
With Wolf back in after a neutral zone face-off, Marner completed the hat trick with a nice wrap-around move to give Vegas a 6-3 lead.
Vegas held on for the win. Third period shots were 6-3 Golden Knights.

Why the Flames lost

This was a better outing than the Flames had against Colorado, but it was far from perfect. The Flames gave Vegas six power plays off some fairly undisciplined hockey from time to time. Their defensive zone details were inconsistent throughout the game, and Vegas’ top line really took advantage of their fairly permissive allowance of passing zones – if you move around fast enough in the Calgary zone, their coverage gets jammed up and big lanes open up.
The Flames hung in there for two periods, but they were out-shot in all three periods. They were the second-best club on the ice.

Red Warrior

We’re gonna tip our caps to Blake Coleman, who had a pair of goals and was generally superb.

Turning point

Vegas scored a pair of goals in just under three minutes in the third period, off a gap in defensive coverage by the fourth line and a puck miscue by Wolf. Two little mistakes on two shifts was enough to cost the Flames a road win.

This and that

After allowing four goals in 9:19 against Colorado, Dustin Wolf was back in net. Yan Kuznetsov and Connor Zary returned from injuries and Martin Pospisil from being a scratch, which bumped Hunter Brzustewicz, John Beecher and Brennan Othmann from the lineup.
This was the return to Vegas for new Flame, and 2023 Stanley Cup champion, Zach Whitecloud. He got a tribute video and a standing ovation from the home crowd during a first period TV timeout.

After Burner

Join Cami Kepke and Mike Gould right after the game for After Burner!

Up next

The Flames (31-36-8) are back in action on Saturday night against the Anaheim Ducks.

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