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Game Day vs Kings — Heart Attack Hockey Returns — Mantha’s Season Over |
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Reminder: Today’s game will be broadcasted on Amazon Prime.
The Calgary Flames get set for their first back-to-back of the season tonight against the 9-4-3 LA Kings. Returning from a 1-0-2 road trip and fresh off two extra time losses, Head Coach Ryan Huska’s squad is fighting some familiar narratives.
Giving up early leads appears to be a recurring phenomena in November for the team. Calgary erased third period deficits in all three games their road trip.
This recurrence goes back to November of last season. The team found themselves trailing by a goal or more in ten of their 14 games that month. Despite putting themselves in tough circumstances, the Flames went 4-4-2 under those conditions.
To put that into context, the NHL average for wins when starting the third down by one or more goals was 4.46. The Flames packed almost an entire season’s worth of comeback into just one month.
Well, that appears to be happening again. Calgary has once again channeled heart attack hockey. While it may not be conducive with getting a strong draft pick; perhaps just remind yourself that the comebacks went away once December began last season. Maybe that will be the case again.
It is also worth noting that when the Flames didn’t start the third period with a deficit in November last season, they went 4-0-0.
The Opposition
The LA Kings are going after their fourth win in five games tonight after pulling out a clumsy win over the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday.
Much like the Flames, the Kings gave up the first goal of the game. Unlike Calgary, LA rallied after a weak first and throttled the Blue Jackets for a 2-0 second period and an eventual 5-2 win. Former Edmonton Oiler, Warren Foegele, had a goal and assist on the night.
The Flames will certainly be punching up tonight. The Kings have the seventh best offence (3.60 goals per game) and a fourth ranked defence (2.00 goals against per game) since the beginning of November. They’ve excelled at controlling the middle of the ice and both of their goaltenders are running hot. Both David Rittich and Darcy Kuemper have allowed only three combined goals in their last two starts.
Fun While It Lasted
Per Pat Steinberg of the Fan 960, Anthony Mantha’s season is over. He will be getting surgery on his knee later this week. He injured his ACL in the game against the Montreal Canadiens last Tuesday.
Mantha is an unrestricted free agent on July 1, 2025 and was expected to be a trade deadline rental.
Flames Connection
Samuel Helenius will play his second career NHL game and first game on the road tonight. His father, the six-foot-six Sami Helenius made his NHL debut at the Dome on December 14, 1996. The giant Finn played seven games with the Flames over two seasons before making stops in Tampa Bay, Chicago, Dallas, and Colorado.
Samuel is also six-foot-six and showed well in his first game. The 59th overall selection in 2021 recorded a secondary assist on a second period Warren Foegele tally.
Getting the Call
It looks like he’s not dressing for today’s game, but Adam Klapka has been recalled from the AHL Wranglers. The six-foot-seven Czech recorded three goals and two assists for five points in his last three games in the minors.
Calgary Flames Projected Lineup
No word on lineups. Per Pat Steinberg, Jake Bean, Joel Hanley and Adam Klapka stayed on the ice after practice and likely won’t dress.
Zary-Kadri-Sharangovich
Huberdeau-Pospisil-Kuzmenko
Coleman-Backlund-Coronato
Lomberg-Rooney-Kirkland
Bahl-Andersson
Weegar-Miromanov
Barrie-Pachal
Wolf
Vladar
LA Kings Projected Lineup
Same situation. Going off of last game.
Kempe – Kopitar - Thomas
Moore – Danault - Fiala
Foegele – Byfield - Laferriere
Lee – Helenius – Lewis
Anderson – Gavrikov
Edmundson – Clarke
Englund – Spence
Rittich
Kuemper
Puck drop is around 6:40 p.m. MST. Catch it on Amazon Prime.
Stats courtesy of the American Hockey League and the National Hockey League.
Calgary Flames Blogger • 
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