The Calgary Flames are playing like a team that is obsessed with making the playoffs. After a big shootout win in Nashville on Tuesday, the Calgary Flames put together a great effort to win their first game ever in Atlanta. Miikka Kiprusoff stopped 22 of 24 shots to backstop the Flames to a 4-2 win.
Mark Giordano opened the scoring for the Flames by blasting a slap shot past Thrashers goalie Ondrej Pavelec just under 5 minutes into the first period. Brian Little tied it less than a minute into the 2nd period and Anthony Stewart put the Thrashers ahead 2-1 about 10 minutes later.
The Flames of old would have folded at this point, but the Calgary Flames 2.0 didn’t. Instead of breaking down and letting the Thrashers increase their lead, the Flames put Jarome Iginla, Brendan Morrison and Alex Tanguay on the ice and they owned the Thrashers for almost a full minute before finding the back of the net. Morrison was the beneficiary of sweet Tanguay-Giordano passing play and found the puck on his stick with a wide open net.
In a scary moment, Thrashers defenceman Freddy Meyer collapsed at centre ice and remained on the ice for a couple minutes while the doctors checked him out. Meyer ended up skating off the ice under his own power, but it left a few questions about what happened, especially after Pavelec’s similar collapse a while ago. The Thrashers have officially said that he has an “upper body injury.”
With the game tied, the Flames and Thrashers went end-to-end for the rest of the second period and the start of the third. It could have gone either way, but the Flames had the bigger effort and were rewarded with a gritty goal at 14:03. After a long shift of banging in Atlanta’s end, Mikael Backlund shoveled the puck towards a crowded Thrashers’ net and was lucky enough to have the puck direct off a defender’s skate and into the net. Backlund’s 6th goal of the season was also the Calgary Flames first ever game winner in Atlanta.
The Flames have now won 6 games in-a-row for the first time since 2008 and remain in the playoff race.
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Greg is the founder of Red Mile Blog has been following the Flames through good times and bad since they arrived in Calgary in the early 80s. He has written hundreds of articles on the Flames since 2005 and considers himself an expert on hockey inconsistency and frustration. He shoots right and usually plays defence, but has been known to jump up in the rush. He is a 2-time CAHL men's league champion and knows the sweet taste of beer from a Cup.
