If there’s one takeaway from the first three months of the Calgary Flames’ 2024-25 season, it’s that they’re a pretty self aware group. They know what they are and they know how they need to play in order to have success.

So when something in their game is lacking, they know it.

This is a group that, for all its positives, just doesn’t have game-stealing offensive talent right now. And so they need to play a consistent 60 minutes of tight-checking hockey in order to earn points. On Thursday night, they were too leaky in a 5-3 home loss to the Utah Hockey Club.

“I just thought we got off our game, especially in the third,” said alternate captain Rasmus Andersson. “And, you know, stretches, we were there, stretches we weren’t. And it cost us today. And, yeah, just not a good enough third period.”

Andersson agreed with the assessment that the club’s puck management wasn’t good, again singling out the third period.

“It was just sloppy out there, honestly,” said Andersson. “And, yeah, not good enough. Too many turnovers and, you know, they have a lot of skill up front. And you give them time and space and they’re going to score and they did. And, yeah, kind of left Vladdy out to dry in the third. So, as I said, you know, just not good enough in the third.”

The Flames allowed two goals by Utah in the opening 2:38 of the third period, transforming a 3-2 Flames lead into a 4-3 Utah lead and turning a third period where they would’ve tried to manage a lead into one where they were chasing the tying goal.

“I thought it was the whole third period, to be quite honest with you,” said head coach Ryan Huska. “I thought our game was coming in the second period. And you had a feeling like we were going to keep that going. But we had a detail issue on the first shift where they scored that first goal, and then a change issue on the second one. And I didn’t feel like we had a lot of pushback from there.”

The tying goal, scored 37 seconds into the third period, was a case of a missed defensive assignment. Both Flames defenders (Andersson and Kevin Bahl) were tangled up with Utah’s Barrett Hayton, leaving Clayton Keller free to deflect Olli Maatta’s shot.

The go-ahead goal, scored just under two minutes later, was scored off a poorly-executed line change by the home side, which gave Lawson Crouse ample time and space to get a shot off.

The Flames aren’t a bad hockey club. They’re very much in the thick of the playoff race and have earned that positioning with their play through 38 games. But the past three months of Flames hockey has shown that the margin of error for the club on any given night is razor thin.

A pair of lapses at key times in a close game sunk them on Thursday against Utah.