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Are the Flames a Playoff Team? Lekkerimaki Debuts on Line One - Game Day |
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The Calgary Flames finish out an early-week back-to-back tonight against a Canucks team struggling to live up to greater expectations following a push into the second round of the 2024 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Plenty to cover, so let's dive into players and storylines to follow.
Re-Tooling Indeed
With a 3-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings on Monday night, the Flames improved to 3-1-2 on the month of November.
That may be the most polished three wins and three losses in franchise history. That record puts the team in a three-way tie for third place in the NHL since the beginning of November.
Going on extended streaks where the team rarely loses in regulation is a not-so-easy way of making sure that the organization won’t be a contender in the next draft lottery, but what if, now bear with me here, we look at the points in the standings as a good thing?
If they keep this going, we might actually start to believe that the Flames are in the playoff race. After all, the Los Angeles Kings are leading the Pacific Division. A tired Calgary squad just beat them fairly soundly.
The Flames currently sit in 11th place in both standings and 13th place in points percentage. Does that mean they are a better team than the teams below them in the latter?
Certainly, worthy of some debate.
This group has a tendency to seesaw. It’s likely that a four or five game losing streak is right around the corner. The only difference between this year and last year is that Calgary is seesawing closer to the .550 points percentage mark. Last year it they did their dance with around .450 as their median until they started losing heavily down the stretch.
The Canucks
Meanwhile, Vancouver has played three fewer games and has only two fewer points than Calgary’s 19. While the Flames may be a bad team playing well, Vancouver is still a better team when they’re playing sub-optimally.
Usually an offensive driver, JT Miller has a mere 11 points in 13 games. Sure, that’s more than any Flames forward has, but more is expected.
Likewise, Elias Petterson has struggled. Three goals and four points in 13 outtings. He cited knee issues at the end of last season and Canucks fans more or less have to play a perpetual game of educating their fanbase that it can be difficult to dominate the NHL when you have a bad knee.
Now, if Petterson were healthy—the Canucks are likely contending for the President’s Trophy.
We can go deeper. Hronek isn’t putting up points or even defending as well as he could be. Hoglander has been sleepwalking since their third game of the season. Boeser is concussed after finding himself on the receiving of a dirty Tanner Jeannot hit.
Demko hasn’t played a game this season. Their backup, Kevin Lankinen, is playing well this season, but is coming off getting shelled by the Oilers in a 7-2 loss. Lankinen saved 20 of 27 shots on the night.
Trouble
In spite of all of that, there is a good story heading into this game for Canucks fans. Rookie Jonathan Lekkerimäki will be making his debut tonight after being called up on Sunday.
“I don’t like to throw too much at him.” Said Canucks Head Coach Rick Tocchet to the media earlier today. "We have some system stuff to give to him, but we don’t want to overload him.”
The 20-year-old right-shot sniper scored five goals and added two assists in seven AHL games with the Abbotsford Canucks prior to getting the call.
That serves as bad news for Flames fans and great news for the 15th overall draft selection in 2022. NHLers making their debuts tend to find the back of the net when the opposition is the Calgary Flames.
Calgary Flames Projected Lineup
Courtesy of Pat Steinberg. @Fan960Steinberg
Zary-Kadri-Sharangovich
Huberdeau-Pospisil-Kuzmenko
Coleman-Backlund-Coronato
Lomberg-Rooney-Kirkland
Bahl-Andersson
Weegar-Miromanov
Barrie-Pachal
Vladar
Wolf
Vancouver Canucks Projected Lineup
Monday’s practice lines courtesy of Ben Kuzma. @benkuzma
Suter-Miller-Lekkerimaki
DeBrusk-Pettersson-Garland
Heinen-Blueger-Sherwood
Joshua-Raty-Hoglander
Hronek-Juulsen
Soucy-Myers
Brannstrom-Desharnais
Lankinen
Silovs
Game time is 8:00 p.m. MST. Catch the broadcast on Sportsnet Pacific and Sportsnet One.
Stats courtesy of the American Hockey League and the National Hockey League.
Calgary Flames Blogger • 
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