The Calgary Flames won their first game at home tonight since Oct. 7th. They now have just two wins at the ‘Dome this season.
Well, it took three weeks, but the Calgary Flames finally got another win on home-ice tonight against the Washington Capitals. This is just their second win at the ‘Dome this season, going 2-4-0. Their first win came in their home-opener on Oct. 7th against the Winnipeg Jets. The Flames were also coming off a two-game losing streak, so it must have felt great to get this one back.
First period
The first period was scoreless, but on the bright side, the Flames actually managed to kill off a penalty. Their penalty-kill (and special teams in general) have been nothing short of awful these last few games. In the last three games (not including tonight), they’ve allowed 2/3 powerplay goals against (in each game), allowing 6/9 PP goals against and killing off just 33.3%. In their last two games, it’s costed them those games.
The Flames were playing a tired Capitals team tonight after they played up north against the Edmonton Oilers last night where they won 5-2 with two goals from Evgeny Kuznetsov and three assists from Alexander Ovechkin. Those two remained off the scoresheet tonight.
Calgary Flames
Second Period
The Flames started the second period on the penalty-kill with taking a late first-period penalty. And to everyone’s surprised, they managed to kill it off. Killing off two penalties in one game? Unheard of lately with this team. The Flames came out strong in the second period once their penalty ended and it paid off with an early goal from a tip-in by Micheal Ferland from a shot that came from Brett Kulak. Johnny Gaudreau also assisted on this play, bringing him to 11 assists on the year and 14 points which leads all Flames skaters. Brett Kulak drew in tonight instead of Matt Bartkowski, and it definitely paid off.
He had a 60% CF% at even-strength whereas Bartkowski rarely gets above 50% on a given night. But he’s still looking for his first NHL goal.
The post was not the Flames friend tonight. Troy Brouwer had a great chance in the second period, but it hit the post. Micheal Ferland, who opened up the scoring, hit the post another time and hit the crossbar at one point. That’s basically a hat trick!
The Final Twenty
The third period started off relatively quiet for both teams until four minutes in and the Caps were in the Flames zone. But luckily, Flames captain Mark Giordano was there to clear the puck. Should be good, right? Well, not exactly. The linesman decided to stand inside the line instead of outside of it like he should, the puck bounced off his skate and onto a Caps stick and it went in the net. A very unlucky chance for the Flames who dominated most of the second period (They had 26 even-strength shot attempts vs. the Caps’ 11 in the second).
But it’s alright, because five minutes later, Johnny Gaudreau made a smart play when he had a good chance to potentially put the puck in the net, noticed there wasn’t a clear shot, circled back and slid a beautiful pass to linemate Sean Monahan who wristed it in and put the Calgary Flames back on top.
The pass from @johngaudreau03 – right on the Mony. #WSHvsCGY https://t.co/KlYpCHweiw
— NHL (@NHL) October 30, 2017
This would end up being the game-winning goal. The Flames would go on to get two power plays in the last ten minutes of the game. Weird. Maybe the refs actually felt bad for that goal by the Caps? Who knows.
Mike Smith tonight stopped 30 of 31 shots and Phillip Grubauer for the Caps stopped 36 of 38 shots. Johnny Gaudreau now has points in six of his last seven games and has 15 points in 13 games. Johnny Gaudreau has been quietly and sneakily racking up the points, but nobody’s talking about it. He’s tied for fourth in points and tied for third in assists with 12.
Next: Flames need to stay out of the penalty box
The Calgary Flames are now 6-6-0 and will get three days off where they’ll play yet another tired team against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday evening who will play in Edmonton the night before. The Pens haven’t been good in their second game of back-to-backs and let’s hope the Flames can take advantage of that and get their first home win-streak of the season.