Quote:
Originally Posted by Erick Estrada
Did they lay a hit on him the entire series? Wasn't Tkachuk supposed to be one of those guys that gets under the skin of opposing players? I wouldn't be surprised if he was delivering coffee to the Avs locker room prior to games as he turned into Mr. Nice guy. There's been plenty of Flames 1st round disappointments over the years but 2019 was definitely the most bizarre. They literally stopped being the regular season Flames the moment the playoffs started as Smith started playing great (this was a good thing) and the team around him kind of stopped doing everything that brought them regular season success.
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During the the regular season... Mackinnon was literally crying when playing against the Flames (yelling and crying to his coach even)... and we beat them all three times... then comes the playoffs and we are intimated by him in Games 2-5 to the point where he is absolutely dominated us - we just lost our mojo and will to play, but I'd argue that it wasn't isolated to just the playoffs... we were off our game arguably from the all-star break forward. This is when coaching needed to occur... we needed a Torts (after the Bule Jackets 1st period of game 1 against Tampa - down 3-0) style pep talk. McKinnon was also looking good against the Sharks until game 5 when the Sharks learned how to play against him and frustrate him - something the Flames did all season with him.