Can you tell how badly I want to beat these guys?
Flames: 30-22-3, 63 points, 4th in the Pacific, 8th in the West, 15th in NHL.
Canucks: 31-20-3, 65 points, 3rd in the Pacific, 7th in the West, 14th in NHL.
The bad news? The Stars, Sharks, and Canucks all won big last night. The good news? The Canucks played last night and had to get on a plane to come to the Saddledome to play tonight, and they're still within 2 points of the Flames. The Flames wake up today still in the last playoff spot in the West, but have a tenuous lead over the Wild (2 points), Kings, and Stars (3 points), with the Wild and Kings owning a game-in-hand. That should be enough motivation to get up for a hated division rival, but if the Flames need any more motivation, they only have to look at the tape from the last game against the Kings where they were manhandled for 3 periods. The pace in the West is picking up big time, and while the Flames have handled playoff style games fairly well overall, there will be more ugly nights like Thursday's unless they come prepared to fight hard every single game. It's a year of learning for this young team, and learning how to respond to the challenges is half the battle.
Tonight, they need to respond in a big way. The Canucks have traditionally given the Flames fits, and Calgary has always had a hard time beating them. They won the last match 1-0 on the back of Joni Ortio and an early Backlund tally that lasted the entire game, ending a string of 9 straight losses to the Canucks. But the Canucks were struggling offensively at that time, only managing 2 goals over 3 games. Now...not so much. They put up 5 last night on a stingy Boston team and have averaged 4.5 GF/G over their last 4 games, and 3.00 GF/G over their last 10. The good news is that they're giving up a fair amount of goals too, averaging 3.2 GA/G in their last 10. Radim Vrbata has an 8 game point streak, posting 3 goals and 6 assists over that time. Our old nemesis, Chris Higgins, has heated up posting 4 points in his last 3 games. Conversely, Nick Bonino has just 1 point in his last 9 games. Offensively speaking, the defense group for the Canucks has been challenged this year. Their top point producer on the blue line is Alex Edler with 17 points, ranked 10th on the Canucks behinds such snipers as Shawn Matthias and Brad Richardson
. The Flames obviously have 4 defensemen with more points (Giordano-44, Brodie-33, Wideman-32, Russell-20), but if you add up all the points from Canucks defensemen in all games this year it would be 81. Gio and Brodie alone have 77.
As good as the Flames d-group has been, the forwards have had spotty production at times. The Flames leading forward point getter, Jiri Hudler, has struggled of late, adding just 2 points in 6 games. One would think that since Hudler has struggled, Gaudreau would also not put up as many points, but he has 4 points in his last 5 games, indicating that his success is not directly tied to Hudler's. Sean Monahan has gone pointless in his last 3 games after having 9 points in his previous 9 games. That line as a whole needs to have a better game tonight. You can't keep relying on Mason Raymond putting up 5 goals in his last 5 games, but thank god he is. Despite playing a lot with Raymond of late, Matt Stajan has just 1 point in his last 10 games. I'd like to hear cogent arguments as to why Granlund can't flat out replace him at this point. Everyone's favorite whipping boy, Curtis Glencross, is now pointless in his last 7 games. I know Glencross is just coming back from injury, and was out for nearly a month over that stretch, but he needs to start sniping a few goals. However, he's done the job defensively, with just one "minus" game in that stretch. Backlund always loves playing the Canucks, so it's good timing for him to break out of his 4 game pointless skid. Thankfully, Lance Bouma of all people has picked up some of the offensive slack with 22 points on the year, and if he scores one more goal he will be the Flames' 9th player to score double digit goals, with Glencross and Brodie sitting at 8 goals right now. One of those double digit scorers is David Jones, who has quietly put up 21 points in 42 games, and 3 points in his last 2 games, including a terrific deflection goal against L.A. On a team with so few big players with skills, Jones has been very valuable for the Flames this year.
These two teams matchup very closely in a lot of ways:
GF/G: Flames-2.84, Canucks-2.80
GA/G: Flames-2.56, Canucks-2.61
5 on 5: Flames-1.04, Canucks-0.99
PP: Flames-17.6%, Canucks-17.8%
PK: Flames-79.2%, Canucks-85.1% (ok, that's a major difference, but the Flames have really done well on the PK of late).
It's really splitting hairs as to which team is better. They have more top end forwards, we have better depth of scoring and points from defensemen. That's about it folks. It should be a close, hard fought game tonight; battling for a playoff spot in an ever tighter race. I have no doubts this will be one of the most entertaining games we've seen in a long time.
Roster Notes: The Flames don't have a lot of actual "injuries" but they are suffering from a bug that has made it's way through most of the team, and you saw how it affected them in L.A. It looks like Byron and Wolf will sit tonight, but no confirmation. The Canucks have not faired as well. Bieksa is still out long term with a broken hand (good), and they've lost Brad Richardson with a long term foot injury. Nick Bonino is still day to day with a leg injury and is not likely to play tonight. Frank Corrado is day to day with an illness. Neither goalie has been confirmed to start, and Miller did play last night in Vancouver, so logic would dictate that Lack will get a start, but who knows.
Flames
Gaudreau-Monahan-Hudler
Bouma-Backlund-Jones
Glencross-Stajan-Raymond
Bollig-Jooris-Colborne
Giordano-Brodie
Russell-Wideman
Diaz-Engelland
Hiller?
Canucks
D.Sedin-H.Sedin-Burrows
Higgins-Vey-Vrbata
Dorsett-Matthias-Kassian
Kenins-Horvat-Hansen
Edler-Tanev
Hamhuis-Sbisa
Stanton-Clendening
Miller?
Go Flames Go!!!