The Calgary Wranglers and San Diego Gulls are coming off Friday night games against other teams in the Division and meet each other for a Saturday showdown. The Wranglers have some bouncing back to do after a tough 8-2 loss to Bakersfield and the Gulls are looking to build off their 5-1 win over the Roadrunners. Calgary has the historical edge against San Diego, but their play since the All-Star break doesn’t show this will be a sure win. They’ll have to show up and step up to prove it.
Projected lines
Calgary
Rory Kerins – Sam Morton – William Stromgren
Sam Honzek – Clark Bishop – Martin Frk
Lucas Ciona – Parker Bell – Ty Tullio
Kyler Kupka – Brett Davis – Alex Gallant
Ilya Solovyov – Jonathan Aspirot
Yan Kuznetsov – Hunter Brzustewicz
Artem Grushnikov – Jeremie Poirier
Devin Cooley
Waltteri Ignatjew
San Diego
Nico Myatovic – Ryan Carpenter – Justin Bailey
Yegor Sidorov – Jan Mysak – Coulson Pitre
Carsen Twarynski – Owen Lindmark – Judd Caulfied
Josh Lopina – Travis Howe
Dillon Heatherington – Tristan Luneau
Stian Solberg – Roland McKeown
Tyson Hinds – Ian Moore
Noah Warren
Ville Husso
Oscar Dansk
Leaders
Calgary
Martin Frk – 58GP, 23G, 29A
Rory Kerins – 54GP, 27G, 24A
Dryden Hunt – 48GP, 15G, 33A (Inactive on NHL call-up)
San Diego
Tristan Luneau – 50GP, 7G, 41A
Ryan Carpenter – 63GP, 19G, 25A
Sasha Pastujov – 38GP, 17G, 25A
Notes and expectations
The Wranglers lost control of their lead on Friday against the Condors and need to clean things up for this game in San Diego. They took a 2-0 lead in the first period then were scored on five times in the second. By the end of the third period, they were up to eight unanswered goals and lost 8-2. After the results of Friday, the Wranglers are still in sixth, the Roadrunners and Condors are tied for seventh place and the Gulls are in eighth place.
All remaining games are important but the next three are against teams fighting for Calgary’s spot and the ones who will benefit most from taking them down. Face to face, Calgary has had the edge on San Diego in the season series. Calgary has won the majority of their meetings and holds a 5-1-1-0 winning record.
Both teams were played last night and because it is a back to back, it’s likely they’ll start their other goalies. If that is the case, this game will be Oscar Dansk versus Waltteri Ignatjew between the pipes. Despite the high scoring game on Friday, the Wranglers’ coaching staff opted to keep Devin Cooley in for the whole game. After that result, and it being so late in the regular season, it doesn’t seem right to test that game plan for this game the following night.
This one off game will wrap up the season series between Calgary and San Diego and game time gets going at 7:00 p.m. MT. Streaming options are available for a fee on AHLtv on Flo Hockey and multiple FlamesNation contributors will have updates on X (formerly Twitter).
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