11-14-2017, 08:20 AM
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#1
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Franchise Player
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: Waterloo, Ontario
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Tuesday November 14th, 2017
Flames defeat Blues in back-and-forth game
Kris Versteeg scored the game-winner with 5:31 remaining in the third period, and Eddie Lack made 13 saves in relief to help the Calgary Flames to a 7-4 victory against the St. Louis Blues at Scotiabank Saddledome on Monday.
Mark Jankowski had two goals and an assist, and Sam Bennett, Micheal Ferland, Johnny Gaudreau and Michael Frolik each scored for the Flames (10-7-0), who went 5-2-0 on their season-high seven-game homestand. Calgary will play its next six games on the road.
"It's a big win for us," Versteeg said. "We knew how good they've been playing. You don't think you're going to score that many goals against that team. It's definitely big for us."
Performance Curve: Just Like a Year Ago, are the Flames on the Verge of Climbing out of the Dip
Ground zero.
Exactly one year ago, that's the point Calgary was at in its season.
The Flames woke up on the morning of Nov. 13, 2016, with a 5-10-1 record. They sat 29th in the overall standings, one point up on Arizona, but sorted by winning percentage, they were alone in the cellar with a .344 mark. The Coyotes (.357) held two games in hand.
The upwards trajectory that would land Calgary a wild card spot at season end and an invitation to the exclusive Stanley Cup playoffs began at that point.
They beat Minnesota 1-0 on Nov. 15, a night in which they lost their best offensive player -- Johnny Gaudreau suffering a broken finger.
Flames 7, Blues 4 post-game embers: At long last, goals
Heading into this game, the Flames were fifth in the NHL in 5v5 CF/60, but 21st in GF/60. They were also 16th in CA/60, but fourth in GA/60. (Now, they’re sixth, 17th, 16th, and third, so the offensive gap is closing while they appear to still be playing above their heads in the defensive department.)
In other words: the Flames have been really good at generating shot attempts, but for whatever reason, they just plain haven’t been translating into goals. Every indication was that they should be at some point, that the Flames were doing too good a job at bringing the puck to the opposition’s net for it to not start going in.
Well, they now have 13 goals in their past two games, so it looks like the tide is turning. They’ve jumped up to 2.88 goals per game – tied for 16th in the NHL, which is much better than the 29th, 30th spot they were hanging out around back when the homestand started.
How Good Can Johnny Gaudreau Get?
Gaudreau has always been good. He was good in previous seasons, at lower levels, and he’s been consistently pretty good in the NHL. But through the first 20% of the 2017-18 season, Gaudreau has produced at previously-unseen levels with 22 points over the first 16 games. It’s easily his best start since joining the Flames and comes with the rest of the team still trying to figure out how to bury their chances.
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