How the Flames can sweep the season series vs. Blackhawks
The Calgary Flames begin their road trip tonight vs. the Chicago Blackhawks where they’ll look to sweep the season series.
The Calgary Flames are finally going on a road trip tonight. Normally, people aren’t too excited for road trips, but the Flames have been one of the best road teams this season. They’re 13-5-5 on the road and a mere 13-13-3 at home. During their seven game win streak, four games were played on the road.
Then they returned home with just one game on the road and lost six of those seven games.
The Flames and Chicago Blackhawks play their third and final matchup of the season tonight. The Flames have won both games by a score of 4-3, both in OT. So how can the Flames sweep the season series vs. the Blackhawks? We’ve got some ideas here.
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Like last time – don’t get overconfident
Last time these two teams played just three days ago, one of the key points was for the Calgary Flames to not get overconfident. And it worked. The first period was quite evenly played, but the Blackhawks were up 1-0. The Flames came back from a 2-0 deficit and tied the game a 3-3 in the third, which was their best period.
They had 24 shot attempts (5v5) compared to the Blackhawks’ 14. They also had 12 scoring chances compared to the Hawks’ 4.
In the game on NYE, the Flames were up 3-0, which the Hawks tied it, and they had a horrible third period. The Blackhawks tied up the game late and had 20 shot attempts compared to the Flames’ 13. Maybe the Flames should make sure the Hawks score the first goal and they’ll be alright.
Use the 3M line against their top guys
Calgary Flames
Advanced stats don’t always tell everything, but they do help. Looking at the past two games, it’s clear what Calgary Flames lines perform well against the Blackhawks top players. On NYE, the Flames top line performed the best vs. the Blackhawks bottom two lines. And a player like Patrick Kane spent the most amount of time on the ice against the Flames top line.
However, whenever he was on the ice vs. the 3M line, which wasn’t a lot, he struggled getting anything going, and had a mere CF% of 25%. Again, he didn’t spend a lot of time against this line, but when he did, it wasn’t great.
On Saturday evening, this repeats. He had 0% CF% against the 3M line and played the most vs. the Flames top line where his CF% was above 50%. This is the same with Jonathan Toews, one of the better two-way centres of the game. In the game on NYE, his puck possession was quite impressive on against any line he played. But on Saturday, he also had 0% CF% vs. the 3M line.
If the 3M can just play against every line, that would be ideal.
Get offence from every line
Last time, one of the keys to the game was also to keep up the offence. And that’s not changing. They’ve scored four goals in their last two games and are finally coming out of that “losing 2-1 in OT” trend. But not only keep up the offence, get contribution from every line.
In the last game vs. the Blackhawks, the Calgary Flames had goals from three different lines. On NYE, they had goals from two different lines with the OT goal going to Mark Giordano. If the Flames can continue to get offence from their fourth or third line players, that’ll help a lot with their offence.
We already know that players like Matthew Tkachuk and Sean Monahan don’t have that much trouble putting points on the scoresheet. So it’s nice to sit back once in a while.
What do you think? Can the Flames sweep the season series vs. the Blackhawks?