[PGT] Oilers 7, Flames 4 -- Nadir

[Flash Walken]

Talk about D-pairings all you want, but no goalie was more responsible for a loss last season than Elliott was for this one.

If he can stop a beachball the Flames win this game.

Hiller-esque performance from him in the opening game.

What should be the focus for Flames fans the day after was how awful Calgary's offense looked last night. Calgary's almost complete lack of wingers is a serious, serious problem.

This team is going to struggle to score if they can't get some finish from their top 9 forwards.

[FlamesAddiction]

Also, just to add, but do the Oilers have more pre-game ceremonies and hoopla than any other team in the leauge?

I get that they were showcasing their new building and it deserved a few minutes of attention, but holy crap is it painful if you are not a fan of the team. I don't know what kind of effect it has on the players as well. I get part of the "home" advantage includes building up the home team for a psychological advantage, but last night was overkill.

[DiracSpike]

I would agree with those saying GG just took that complete bull#### turn around from non call on Johnny to phantom call on McCollarbone lying down. You need to be red in the face screaming at the refs about that, at least that way the team knows you have their backs.

Good coaches don't whine, but they canvas for calls, letting the refs know that they ####ed up, because without that the refs only have the cheers of the orange clad morons in the stands to go on.

Gulutzan keeps reminding me of Playfair, hopefully he cleans up his act as the season progresses.

[Ruttiger]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

Also, just to add, but do the Oilers have more pre-game ceremonies and hoopla than any other team in the leauge?

I get that they were showcasing their new building and it deserved a few minutes of attention, but holy crap is it painful if you are not a fan of the team. I don't know what kind of effect it has on the players as well. I get part of the "home" advantage includes building up the home team for a psychological advantage, but last night was overkill.

I don't entirely disagree. Even as a fan of the team, enough is enough. I won't mind if we don't see any of the glory gang trotted out for awhile now.

[Frank MetaMusil]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

Coaching change is a big one. The minute Treliving decided to make that change, we should have realistically expected some growing pains. Hopefully they are short.

It's strange that he hired an assistant under Willie Dejsardins though, who was/is awful at line matching.

Don't forget that Sigalet is still around too (no idea why you'd keep the goalie coach of the 30th ranked team in GA)

To me last night's result wasn't surprising at all. I think Treliving is overrated and this season is going to be tough sledding with all his changes. If this season is a failure it's completely on him now.

[Ruttiger]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

What should be the focus for Flames fans the day after was how awful Calgary's offense looked last night. Calgary's almost complete lack of wingers is a serious, serious problem.

This team is going to struggle to score if they can't get some finish from their top 9 forwards.

I suspect that played a pretty large role in Versteeg's decision to head to Calgary. The opportunity was staring him in the face, whereas in Edmonton if Draisaitl is on the wing, he's the 3rd line option at best.

[polak]

Originally Posted by Firebot

We are playing 3 games in 4 nights with little time to adjust, and it's a long season, but as we saw last year, it can quickly be lost in the first few weeks.

We were in a playoff spot in December last year.

It takes a lot to derail an entire season.

[Bandwagon In Flames]

Originally Posted by Mattman

One thing that bothered me last night was seeing the lines switched up half way through the game (i.e. Brouwer on the 1st line, Ferland with Bennett a couple times)

I mean I get we are losing the game by 2 goals, but moving players around and expecting them to produce and magically find a way to start playing better doesn't make sense to me. Like you had all of pre-season to figure this out and you kept the same lines rolling through pre-season.

Just another reason why I'm not sold on Gulutzan and the coaching staff.

They didn't have 'all of preseason to figure this out'. They didn't have a top line for all of training camp. The RW they slotted on the top line has played 1 practice with the team.

I will say that I didn't like seeing Brouwer move lines, but GG was trying to get Johnny and Monny going. They were both pretty bad last night, but with all things considered it's not a big surprise.



I get that they want to change up from last season. But it's dumb to change something just for the sake of changing it when there's no logic to the decision.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Frank MetaMusil

It's strange that he hired an assistant under Willie Dejsardins though, who was/is awful at line matching.

Don't forget that Sigalet is still around too (no idea why you'd keep the goalie coach of the 30th ranked team in GA)

To me last night's result wasn't surprising at all. I think Treliving is overrated and this season is going to be tough sledding with all his changes. If this season is a failure it's completely on him now.

Yeah, but to be fair, you decided that you didn't like the coach before a single game, preseason or otherwise, had been played.

If this is anything like your previous coaching criticisms I eagerly look forward to several years of banal whining, hand wringing and consternation from you.

[CSharp]

Holy crap, if Elliiot stays in his crease all season long and looks like another Hiller, this is going to be a long dreadful season and many dreadful seasons to come. Then, we'd be wondering if last night's game could've been won if Hartley was still the head coach. The game last night in the first period alone was so God aweful with the dump-and-chase, it's not even worth watching. Can't believe why Elliot wasn't pulled when he led in 3 goals on 5 shots.

Still can't believe Wideman is on the first D-line with Gio when it's supposed to be Gio and Brodie. Why mess with a good thing when it's working?

On the bright side, Backlund looks pretty awesome.

[Bandwagon In Flames]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

What should be the focus for Flames fans the day after was how awful Calgary's offense looked last night. Calgary's almost complete lack of wingers is a serious, serious problem.

This team is going to struggle to score if they can't get some finish from their top 9 forwards.

I'm more worried about the 7 goals we allowed than our wingers. The wingers scored 3 goals last night (0 from the top line) and the Flames were a top-10 scoring team last year so why are you concerned about that aspect?

We need to play better defense and get better goaltending while continuing to put up similar offense from the past 2 years.

[Five-hole]

I've already posted in this thread a bunch but I can't get over how disappointed I am in this team.

And not just the execution, which was bad. It was disjointed and lackluster, at best. At worst it was apathetic.

It was the preparation. If there was one game this year which should have been circled as "we have to win this game", it was this one. What would have been better than spoiling the Oilers circlejerk in their new arena, AND getting the season off to a great start?

Instead, we get trampled by the Oilers wunderkind and they have a great feel good story to start their season, and we're navelgazing and wondering what went wrong.

Preseason should have been a steady, upward trajectory of preparedness. Last game should have been a dress rehearsal, not an audition. It is absolutely indefensible that we were still auditioning PTOs and bubble players. The last game should have been our game 1 roster and should have been treated as the first game of the season. I just don't get it. It doesn't help that three of our most important players (Mono, Johnny, and Backlund) all had varying degrees of non-participation in training camp, sure. But that doesn't explain how the last preseason game was utilized. And, unsurprisingly, we were soundly trounced by a team that was using the last preseason game for this very thing.

Then, game 1 of the season, and it's all new D pairings. The PP lines were different than they were in the preseason. On and on.

Just... ugh. Complete and utter failure by coaching and management to have this team ready for game 1. I am just so, so disappointed.

[locsofblu]

Watching the game now. Elliot is grabage.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by DiracSpike

I would agree with those saying GG just took that complete bull#### turn around from non call on Johnny to phantom call on McCollarbone lying down. You need to be red in the face screaming at the refs about that, at least that way the team knows you have their backs.

Good coaches don't whine, but they canvas for calls, letting the refs know that they ####ed up, because without that the refs only have the cheers of the orange clad morons in the stands to go on.

Gulutzan keeps reminding me of Playfair, hopefully he cleans up his act as the season progresses.

Out of curiosity have you ever coached, or dealt with officials?

As much as people romanticize this, it doesn't work. There's a reason why your seeing less and less fly off the handle embarrass the referee type of coaches now.

Because it simply doesn't work, go ahead and embarrass a ref, yell your a$$ off, then be prepared to get a FU call when you can least afford it.

When you watch football, and you see coaches screaming at refs, that conversation that you see on the sideline isn't the ref apologizing or crying about how he screwed up a call.

Its the ref telling the coach to STFU and get off of his back or he can enjoy the game from the TV in the coaches office.

And the players don't sit there and go, awesome the coach has our back. They're all cringing and wondering if the other shoe is going to drop.

A coaches temperament is reflected by the players at all levels. Its likely if you have a coach losing his nut and screaming at the officials, the players are going to take up that insanity.

I've coached with head coaches, who go hard after the refs, its never ever gotten us a even up call, or an apology from the officials, or changed the way that the game is called ever. Most of the time the officiating has gotten worse for us. Not intentionally but the refs will suddenly a lot more on our side then theres.

[Iniggywetrust]

Originally Posted by Mattman

One thing that bothered me last night was seeing the lines switched up half way through the game (i.e. Brouwer on the 1st line, Ferland with Bennett a couple times)

I mean I get we are losing the game by 2 goals, but moving players around and expecting them to produce and magically find a way to start playing better doesn't make sense to me. Like you had all of pre-season to figure this out and you kept the same lines rolling through pre-season.

Just another reason why I'm not sold on Gulutzan and the coaching staff.

Literally every coach does this if your guys aren't playing well. If he didn't, we'd be on him for sticking with the same lines despite their eneptitude.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by polak

We were in a playoff spot in December last year.

It takes a lot to derail an entire season.

Who are you?!

Seriously—I'm so confused right now.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by CSharp

Holy crap, if Elliiot stays in his crease all season long and looks like another Hiller, this is going to be a long dreadful season and many dreadful seasons to come. Then, we'd be wondering if last night's game could've been won if Hartley was still the head coach. The game last night in the first period alone was so God aweful with the dump-and-chase, it's not even worth watching. Can't believe why Elliot wasn't pulled when he led in 3 goals on 5 shots...

Is this honestly a legitimate concern? As badly as the Flames lost last night, I'm actually quite positive about going forward precisely because Elliott has a proven track record of playing much, MUCH better than he did last night.

[polak]

Originally Posted by CSharp

Holy crap, if Elliiot stays in his crease all season long and looks like another Hiller, this is going to be a long dreadful season and many dreadful seasons to come. Then, we'd be wondering if last night's game could've been won if Hartley was still the head coach. The game last night in the first period alone was so God aweful with the dump-and-chase, it's not even worth watching. Can't believe why Elliot wasn't pulled when he led in 3 goals on 5 shots.

Still can't believe Wideman is on the first D-line with Gio when it's supposed to be Gio and Brodie. Why mess with a good thing when it's working?

On the bright side, Backlund looks pretty awesome.

If Elliot plays like this all season and Johnson follows suit, it's not the goalies.

I think Elliot was just fighting the puck last night. Happens. Everyone is freaking out cause it's the first game. If he played fine last night and played like that on Friday the panic about his play wouldn't be any where near this level.

[automaton 3]

Off night for Elliot, he'll bounce back.

Leaving him in for 6 when he is clearly fighting it falls on the coach.

[direwolf]

I think the 4-3 goal was definitely the back breaker. Elliott stops that and the Flames win that game in my opinion.