Quote:
Originally Posted by Bingo
With Tanev missing the first three games, and torn to shreds but playing in game four and five I think the defense gap between the two teams tightened considerably.
What was left was an over taxed top pair, a second pairing guy that couldn't play close to that level without his partner, and the third pair doing their thing.
Can debate the quality of the chances until the cows come home ... the Flames lost a series 4-1 with an expected goal advantage of 17.7 to 16.5 based on the quality of today's stats but were out scored 25-20. If we had the ability to shave high danger chances into categories I think the Oilers would have had substantially more 10 bell chances, but at the end of the day Markstrom wasn't good, and had to make more tough saves than he did.
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Keith, Cecil and Kulak were supposed to be worse than anything the Flames put out there and I feel that just wasn’t the case. Tanev injury or no, either the Oilers D played much better than expected, they game planned and played to their strengths or Flames didn’t do enough to pressure their back end. I’m sure it was a combination of all of these. Keith was much better than the washed up worst D man in the league many claimed him to be when the Oilers acquired him.