The Calgary Flames hosted the Vegas Golden Knights with a chance to inch closer to the top spot in the division. But they just couldn’t muster much against the Golden Knights, losing a 5-3 decision at home.

Vegas opened the scoring midway through the first period. Ryan Reaves’ initial shot was stopped by David Rittich, but the rebound booted out right to Tomas Nosek and he beat a sprawling Rittich to give the visitors a 1-0 lead.

The Golden Knights added to their lead a little while later off an odd-man rush. Blueliner Nick Holden jumped up with his forward teammates and buried a feed from Nick Cousins to make it a 2-0 game.

The Flames thought they had a goal late in the first period after Mikael Backlund stole the puck from Robin Lehner after an initial stop, but it was ruled to be goalie interference after Vegas challenged the goal.

Shots were 11-9 Flames and scoring chances 10-8 Golden Knights in the first period.

Vegas had an early push in the second period and that draw a penalty and led to a goal. With Mark Giordano in the sin bin, the Golden Knights defended a Backlund shorthanded rush and went the other way. William Karlsson fed Max Pacioretty for a shot that beat Rittich to extend the lead to 3-0 Vegas.

The Flames got one back off a nice individual effort from Milan Lucic. Lucic opted to shoot on two-on-one rush with Dillon Dube, beating Lehner to cut the lead to 3-1 Vegas.

Later on, Dube drew a penalty. On the ensuing Flames PP, Dube broke up a near-breakaway for the Golden Knights. The play went the other way, and Backlund found him as the trailer and he beat Lehner with a wrist shot to cut Vegas’ lead to 3-2.

Shots were 13-6 Golden Knights and scoring chances 16-5 Golden Knights in the second period.

The Golden Knights did a pretty effective job of bottling up the Flames in the third period. But the Flames tied things up with three minutes left, as Andrew Mangiapane fed Matthew Tkachuk for a nifty backhand that beat Lehner to make it 3-3.

But Vegas got that back very quickly, as Shea Theodore’s shot ramped off Mangiapane’s stick and beat Rittich to make it 4-3. Jonathan Marchessault added an empty netter to make it a 5-3 final.

Shots were 10-5 Golden Knights and chances 9-6 Golden Knights n the third period.

Give them credit, the Flames found a way to claw back into this one. But they weren’t particularly good early on and dug themselves a hole.

Lucic. He had a couple points and was bouncing around like a Tazmanian Devil in the offensive zone.

Theodore’s deflected game-winner was a back-breaker after the Flames had worked so hard to claw back from being down 3-0.

Data via Natural Stat Trick. Percentage stats are 5v5.

To commemorate International Women’s Day, Sportsnet had Leah Hextall (formerly of CWHL broadcasts) and Cassie Campbell-Pascall (the usual non-Kelly Hrudey colour commentator) in the TV booth for this game.

Noah Hanifin took the worst of a Milan Lucic hit on Brandon Pirri in the first period. He left the game after just three shifts and never returned.

The Flames have 79 points. A 95 point playoff pace through 70 games pro-rates to 81.1 points, so they’re 2.1 points off a likely playoff pace with 12 games to go.

The Flames (36-27-7) are off on Monday. They’re back in action on Thursday night when they host the New York Islanders.