The Calgary Flames came into this afternoon’s contest in Nashville desperate for a win.

Sixty minutes of hockey later – the majority played with a high level of desperation and precision – the Flames maintained their playoff hopes and got a step closer to a post-season berth by way of a 5-2 win over the powerhouse Nashville Predators.

Here’s how it happened.

Flames carried pace early. Lots of chances. Couldn’t bury them. Josi opened scoring early from the point on one of Nashville’s first chances. Three minutes later, Lance Bouma evened it up with a tremendous individual effort. Bouma fought at the line to chip the puck past a Nashville defender, then stuck with the puck through the slot, having one shot blocked but knocking in his own rebound to tie it up. Kris Russell followed it up with a wrister from the shot – through traffic – near the end of the period to send Calgary to the locker room with a lead. Shots were 10-9 in the first for Calgary.

The Flames continued their strong play in the second. The Predators came out of the locker room with some energy, but the Flames bounced back. They made it 3-1 on a nice cycling play from the fourth line, with Matt Stajan feeding Drew Shore in the corner, who put it out front for Michael Ferland to chip in for his first NHL goal. Mid-way through the period, Jiri Hudler made it 4-1: Deryk Engelland chipped the puck out of the zone and Jiri Hudler grabbed it, out-raced a defender and put a shot five-hole that just squeaked past Carter Hutton. Shots were 13-11 in the second for Calgary.

Nashville came out of the locker room in the third period like a team that realized, “Hey, we’re trying to win the Presidents’ Trophy, why are we down three goals to Calgary?” The answer is because they played last night, but either way, Nashville pushed and pushed and pushed. They finally broke through with a Seth Jones goal on a delayed penalty call on the Flames, but that was as close as they got. The Flames did their best to keep Nashville’s chances to the outside, and Lance Bouma added an empty-netter to ice it at 5-2.

They found their desperation and intensity. They went after loose pucks, they back-checked and they never came up on a play, seemingly. It was helpful that Carter Hutton started instead of Pekka Rinne, that Shea Weber is on the shelf for a couple games and that the Predators seemed disinterested for two periods after clinching a playoff spot last night.

But you know what? Calgary went into this knowing they needed a win to draw close to a playoff spot. They played smart and won. Nobody’s going to give these guys a playoff spot – they’ll have to take it.

They took a big step towards doing that today.

Let’s go with Michael Ferland. While the entire fourth line was really effective all afternoon, Ferland managed the puck well and finally buried his first career NHL goal in the win. Oh, and it held up as the eventual game-winner.

Gotta give props to Lance Bouma (who scored twice) and Mason Raymond, who never scored but was buzzing all afternoon.

Coming soon!

The Flames improve to 41-28-7, and jump into third place in the Pacific, at least for now.

They’re back in action for their 77th game of 2014-15 tomorrow night in Dallas, beginning at 6pm MT.