QOTD: What to make of game one

[Murph]

I don't know what to make of game 1, but I think we'll know how this series plays out by the end of the first period tonight.

[OzSome]

It's only one game. Flames were actually doing well until the first two goals which was a bad turnover. Actually before those two goals Gaudreau gave up the puck on the soft pass that almost cost them a goal. After those two mistakes they abandoned the Flames hockey because they started overthinking and panicked which was unheard of for the Flames. They just couldn't recover from those mistakes and instead of fixing it, they made more and let the Ducks dictate the game. Anaheim got away with a lot of picks and cheating a lot on faceoff. One particular faceoff cheat that stuck to my mind was Getzlaf hitting Jooris leg and stick before the linesman once the linesman let go of the puck. Of course Getzlaf won the faceoff.

I think the Flames are going to be more prepared on Game 2.

[ricardodw]

The Ducks are very good and very big and gritty. They are set to play this style and they played it for their 5 playoff games.

The Flames at this point in their rebuild don't have the horses to stand up to them.

The Flames have to just ignore making hits and play the game at a frantic pace Mason Raymond style and hope for the refs to protect them. Monahan/gaudreau/Hudler have already gone that style .. 9 total hits in 7 playoff games. Wideman/Russell/Brodie 9 total hits in 7 playoff games.

The Flames were able to hide behind Ferland/Engelland/Colborne in the Vancouver series as the Canucks were limited to Dorsett and Bieksa as their gritty representatives.

Anaheim has 12 out of 18 skaters that have more hits (10 or more in 5 games) than the Flames top line or the Flames top 3 d-men.

The Ducks are having fun pushing the Flames around.

The Flames have to win this game as Wideman (hit 5 times)/Brodie (hit 7 times)/Russell(only hit once) will be losing a step if they get the same kind of hammering they took in the first game.

Credit to Hartley protecting Gaudreau in 3rd period of a lost game. The Ducks would have been willing to look bad missing big hits taking a chance on catching him and slowing him down for the rest of the series.

It is kind of shocking that the Flames have no tougher D-men in the whole organization.
Is Kanzig available for game 3.

Look for some apparently bad UFA signings (like Stoner for 4 years 3.2M) in the off season.

[FlamesAddiction]

I think injuries are definitely catching up. Whether that is the primary reason for the poor game the other night, I don't know.


But when you look at the official injuries list, out of the 8 teams left, it isn't even close which team is suffering the most:

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/injuries

And those are only the official injuries. Hudler and Monahan are likely playing well below 100% right now. I also suspect that Ferland, Russell and Wideman are playing with some kind of injury.