Lack gets his Flames baptism in mop-up duty
After four quality starts, Smith dam springs multiple leaks against Senators offence
Well, eventually the Calgary Flames needed to break in Eddie Lack.
But this wasn’t the way they wanted to do it though.
After facing an average of 40 shots in his opening four games, the dam put up by Mike Smith finally burst Friday night at the Saddledome.
It wasn’t another barrage of shots that eventually overcame the veteran netminder in a 6-0 loss to the visiting Ottawa Senators. It was a collection of Grade A scoring chances that conspired to chase Smith from the net midway through the third period.
Five penalty kills into the evening, he finally succumbed to a Derick Brassard slapshot from the point he couldn’t see through Alexandre Burrows.
It put the Senators up 2-0 late in the second period of a game Smith was once again keeping his team in ... until the third.
It was then when Smith finally ran out of answers to a stingy visiting squad that capitalized on great scoring chance after great scoring chance.
“Too many quality chances — we can’t let that happen,” said Flames captain Mark Giordano, whose club managed to kill 4-of-7 penalties. “Especially there on the power play, we have to get in lanes and find a way to kill them. We definitely feel bad, but we have to let this one go.”
Posted on the whiteboard in the team’s dressing room Friday morning was a list of prime scoring chances given up by the Flames in their first four outings: 19, 17, 17, 15, it read.
Flames head coach Glen Gulutzan said the reasonable number should hover around the dozen mark.
Friday night, it didn’t. While Smith faced a much more reasonable 22 shots in 48 minutes, too many were far too dangerous for Smith to continue repelling. He ended up surrendering five before getting the mercy hook.
Gulutzan credited the Senators for their counter-punching abilities. Eventually they led to a knockout.
Enter Lack.
The quirky 29-year-old Swede handled mop-up duty relatively well, saving five of six shots, opening the door for a poten- tially more comfortable starting nod Saturday.
It will be an interesting decision as Smith has been the Flames MVP thus far, and the Flames had five days between games to rest up.
Starting Smith surely gives the team the best chance to win a game against a weaker team they likely see as winnable.
Is it the perfect place for Lack to dive in, especially after getting his feet wet late Friday?
Or do the Flames need to put their best foot forward to try ensuring a better result before their short layoff?
“I haven’t even gotten close to that,” said Gulutzan when asked who’d get the next starting nod.
“We just wanted to get (Lack) some minutes. It’s 5-0, and it’s nothing to do with Smitty. We just thought Lacker needs to get in there and see the puck and get moving around.”
Lack was signed as a free agent this summer to play at least 20 games, which could be problematic if he doesn’t win a good chunk of them.
He’s coming off a season in which he spent brief time with the Carolina Hurricanes’ minorleague affiliate and drew the ire of ’Canes head coach Bill Peters following a particularly tough stretch in net.
Like most backup netminders in the league, he doesn’t necessarily give a team or its fans oodles of confidence unless he can prove otherwise.
He might just get that chance Saturday.
It says here the right move is starting Smith again as his workload wasn’t overwhelming, even if the score was.
That said, Lack has to start sometime.