Change of Pace: Flames Playing Someone Worse Than Them
By Joe
It’s nice to play a team who is worse than you. It doesn’t take many brains to figure that out. The Flames don’t need to play spoilers anymore! It’s impossible to spoil a Nashville Predators season that is already miserable. The Preds’ are sitting in 14th place in the Western Conference at 39 points with a 15-21-9 record and 11 points out of a playoff position. Friday, Nashville took the Blackhawks to overtime but couldn’t win it and ended up losing 5-4. A win tonight would be the clubs first point-streak since March 25. The Predators last win came on April 2 against the Avalanche.
The Flames, on the other hand, are quite hot. Winners in 5 of its last 6 games and feeling confident about playing a team with no playoff hopes likewise. The Flames will mix up the lines a whole lot tonight as 6 of the 7 players called up form the AHL will be in the lineup. The players called up from the AHL are bolded.
Baertschi – Reinhart – Cervenka
Hudler – Horak – Aliu
Bancks – Byron – McGrattan
Hanowski – Street – Jones
Giordano – Carson
Brodie – Cundari
Butler – Babchuk
Kiprusoff
MacDonald
It’s still unknown when or if goalie Leland Irving will get a start. He was recently called up from Abbotsford last week.
“It’s not about spoiling. It’s just about playing hard and winning,” said goalie Joey MacDonald. “We’ve got a lot of young guys here trying to prove a point for next year.”
It’s the final road trip of the season and the Flames want to close it with 3-straight wins. Calgary is in St. Louis on Thursday and ends the season Friday night in Chicago.
Catch tonight’s game on Sportsnet West, listen to it on the Fan960 and watch a live web stream here at 6:00 PM MT.
Prediction: Flames young guys get it done and win 5-2. Kiprusoff stand on his head stopping 40 shots. Bancks nets one as do Carson and Cervenka while Hudler scores twice.