FLAMES FIND POSITIVES IN LOSS
Rangers score three times in third
With the hours and hours of coverage leading up to Super Bowl LI, no one would blame you if you switched channels.
But if you missed the third period of Sunday’s Calgary Flames game against the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden, you would have missed the majority of the action. Scoring action, that is. In the final 20 minutes, the Rangers (33-18-1) broke open a 1-1 tie and pumped three goals past Brian Elliott to capture this one 4-3.
Before panicking, however, this Flames loss didn’t feel as dramatic as their play before the NHL AllStar Game break.
“I thought we played really well,” said forward Troy Brouwer, who was one of two Calgary goal scorers in the third period. “We had stints when we were in their zone and created opportunities. But at the end of the day, we can feel good about our game but we didn’t get any points.”
The loss snapped a three-game winning streak for the Flames (27-25-3) in Calgary’s second game of a three-game road swing before their bye week.
Chalk it up to a learning experience for the Flames who, even with the loss, are still in the second wild-card playoff spot with 57 points.
The Rangers, as they found out in a 4-1 loss on Nov. 12 at Calgary, are an experienced team.
“This is a team that’s been to the Stanley Cup finals two years ago, the Conference finals three years in a row,” Brouwer said.
“They’re a team that’s experienced in the playoffs and knows how to win. Maybe there’s a few things we can take from their game — how they stay patient, how they get in on the forecheck and wait for their opportunities. That’s what they did (Sunday).”
Give them credit, the Flames stuck with the Rangers all game.
There were no large momentum swings or long periods of time where they let New York, the eighth-best team in the NHL, take it to them.
“We gave up three chances and they scored three times,” Flames head coach Glen Gulutzan said.
“I thought they made a push and I thought we responded well, but the fourth goal hurt us.”
The Flames struck some luck at the end of the second period as it appeared Rick Nash had scored a power-play goal thanks to a shot from the top of the circle — with 0.0 seconds left on the clock.
But, after referee Kelly Sutherland reviewed the play, the goal was waved off as the officials found time had expired.
With the Madison Square Garden crowd livid, the action was tied 1-1 heading into the third period.
That didn’t stop the Rangers, who scored with just 1:54 elapsed in the third period — a tough goal for Elliott to give up, as he struggled to get square to shooter Michael Grabner.
Brouwer replied for the Flames, which is what playoff teams do: kill the opposition’s momentum with a goal of their own.
Then, with two back-to-back goals from Chris Kreider (the puck hit Dennis Wideman’s leg and went in) and Jesper Fast (a Jyrki Jokipakka turnover by the net), Calgary was suddenly fighting a two-goal deficit halfway through the third period.
Matthew Tkachuk cut into the lead 1:01 after Fast’s goal — a deflection on Mikael Backlund’s shot which cleanly beat Henrik Lundqvist.
But that was all the King Lundqvist would give them.
Elliott gave up four goals on 32 shots and, given Gulutzan and the Flames are running with a “win and you’re in” approach to their goaltenders, it’s likely Chad Johnson will start on Tuesday against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Gulutzan came to Elliott’s defence.
“One’s a deflection, one’s a turnover right in front of him, and whenever you get seamed, it’s tough to get across,” he said.
At one point in the first period, the shots were 12-5 for the Rangers, but that hardly indicated the pace of the game.
New York is fast, but the Flames kept up — all game.
Dougie Hamilton put the visitors on the board with a power-play goal at the 6:59 mark, Calgary’s ninth man advantage marker in their last nine games.
Nash replied nearly two minutes later with a power-play marker for the Rangers.
“I don’t ever think of it as doom and gloom. If you do, you won’t get anywhere. You just have to keep pushing forward. Every time there is a loss, it’s not doom and gloom. It’s move forward,” Gulutzan said.
The Flames head to Pittsburgh on Monday afternoon to prepare for Tuesday’s game against the third-best team the Eastern Conference, the Penguins (33-13-5).
We gave up three chances and they scored three times. I thought they made a push and I thought we responded well, but the fourth goal hurt us. GLEN GULUTZAN