Calgary Flames three stars of the week: December 4-10

First Star

Sam Bennett

I’ll be honest, if you asked me three weeks ago if Sam Bennett was going to be a star of the week sometime soon, I would have absolutely said no. But he’s turned his season around. Bennett hadn’t registered his first point until the 18th game. In 13 games since, he has 11 points. He also has eight points in his last seven games and is currently on a seven-game home point-streak with 10 points in that stretch.

This past week, he had three points in four games, which isn’t that incredible, but he’s had a good week with lots of chances. One of those points was the game-winning goal vs. the Canucks where, in a tie game, he and his line kept pushing and pushing in the last few minutes of the game, as if they were down a goal. And all that pressure paid off because Bennett scored with just 1:10 left in the game.

Related Story: Flames Daily - Sam Bennett finally impressing

That ended up being the game-winner and he got his first GWG in two years. After his slow start to the season when he was barely even averaging a shot per game, he had 16 SOG in the four games last week. Notably, eight shots vs. the Philadelphia Flyers where he unfortunately only had one assist in that game. But with eight shots, the team having 11 scoring chances (5v5) and five high-danger chances (5v5) with him on the ice, he deserved more points and the Calgary Flames deserved the win. In fact, he personally had five scoring chances and three were high-danger chances.

For all these reasons, he gets the first star of last week.

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And that’s all for the three stars of the week! Has Johnny Gaudreau been on somewhat of a slump? Can Sam Bennett keep up this momentum for the rest of the season? Will Sean Monahan potentially even hit that 50-goal mark? These are the questions I need answers for.