You know it had to happen at some point. Calgary couldn’t go on forever winning without Jarome, and tonight was the night they needed him most. Nashville is one of the top teams in the West and provided a good test for the Flames. Using one of their games in hand against Vancouver, the Flames had an opportunity to put more distance between themselves and the rest of the NW division.
The first period actually started off in the Flames favour. No, they didn’t score special teams goals. But, they did leave the first period up 1 from goals by Langkow and Huselius. In fact, the entire game could be summed up like so: Flames outhit, outshot, outworked, outscored, and they had a horrid 2 minutes in the third (where the Preds scored twice to take the lead).
For some reason the Flames brass think it’s better to have Lundmark who does nothing, hits nothing, looses the puck, and doesn’t score; than Godard, who plays the same time and protects the team. This was honestly a great game for Nashville. They completely outhit Calgary all game, albeit, many questionable hits.
Referees completely missed a number of blatant high hits against the Flames. Elbows to the head were the name of the game tonight. Quite frankly, if it’s not called it’s legal. Only one other team plays like this and it’s Anaheim, and both teams are at the top of league in standings. What should we learn? Quite frankly, hit hard and high, and get nasty out there, it wins games.
I would be interested to see if Calgary has the lowest level of hits from the forwards. That would be an interesting stat because the Flames could not generate any forecheck at times during the game. Ah well, you knew they couldn’t win em all. Better luck next time, Wednesday against Dallas.
Notes: Zyuzin sat again and Girodano factored in and got into penalty trouble. It’s time to stop experimenting. Godard was sent down and the Flames were pushed around. Huselius played OK, getting two goals for 19 on the season.
