The Flames continued their winning ways at home tonight, but the game was interesting for goals that didn’t count and goals that did by the time it was over.

The first period was controlled by the Flames and included a power-play where they managed to keep the pressure in the Columbus zone for almost all of the two minutes and generated some great chances, but Pascal Leclaire was equal to the challenge and kept his team in the game by shutting down some great chances by the Flames. The period was coming to a close when an interference call against Andrei Zyuzin sent the Jackets to the power-play with just over 2 minutes left. On that power-play, the Flames PK was doing a great job of pressuring the puck, but an untimely line-change gave the Jackets the chance they needed to capitalize as the Jackets converted a nice 3 way passing play to net the games first goal. It was disappointing not only because it was yet another late-period goal which tend to be big momentum shifters, but because it came so close to the end of a power-play that had been held in check by the Flames penalty killers.

The second period was fairly forgettable overall… Although the Flames outshot the Jackets 10-4, they didn’t seem to have the flow they had in the first and a little apprehension was creeping into the fans minds as the arena got fairly quiet and the play of Leclaire was looking disturbingly like the type of performance where a hot goalie leads an underdog team to an upset win.

All that changed just over four minutes into the third. Jarome Iginla was able to capitalize on a goal mouth scramble to knot the game at one and then just over two minutes later things got weird. In what can only be described as odd, the goal light behind Leclaire lit up on a shot that beat him but caught iron behind him. This caused the Flames arena horn to sound signifying a home team goal, it also triggered the pyrotechnics behind the goalie that are a staple of Flames scores. At this point the Jackets froze and looked to be ready to dispute the call to the ref… who was actually waving the goal off… The whistle never went however, and Chuck Kobasew playing to the whistle like you’re always told to was able to deposit the puck behind a visibly bewildered Leclaire.

To add to the confusion, just moments later there was another disputed call, when the Flames looked like they had scored again. And although the replay showed that the puck Must have been over the line due to the positioning of Leclaire’s pads, there was no true visual evidence and the goal was waived off after another lengthy debate at the penalty box.

The final result was a needed although largely unspectacular Flames win. Perhaps the Jackets are playing better with Hitchcock as their new coach, but the way the played tonight it was definitely their goaltending that gave them any chance of winning this game. Thanks to an odd play, and some heads up play by Kobasew the Flames escaped with the win.

Have a great day

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