Nothing major to discuss in Flames land right now, so here's some of the news and views about the team making the rounds on the interwebs.
- Matt digs through the Flames corsi numbers and finds that Langkow is driving the bus. Iginla is struggling, in contrast, mostly when he plays with...wait for it...Craig Conroy!
- The 2009 Canadian Junior team roster was set over the weekend. Flames prospect Keith Aulie made the club. Congratulations Keith! Other Flames picks in the tourny include Mitch Wahl (US) and Mikael Backlund (Sweden). John Negrin and Greg Nemisz weren't invited to camp this year (boooooooooo).
- Curtis Glencross is hurt and probably won't be making the trip with the team. That is bad news for the Flames - Glencross and Bourque have been kicking some major ass from the "third line" recently. They, with Matthew Lombardi, were probably the best trio versus Florida the other night. The silver lining is Boyd gets to move back up I suppose.
The question is, who gets the call up? Warren Peters? Jamie Lundmark (leading QC in points)? Kyle Greentree (leading QC in goals)? Kris Chucko (shudder)?
- Mike Keenan is starting to trust Adam Pardy a bit more:
"Against Detroit, we had Robyn (Regehr) up against Hossa quite a bit," Keenan said. "I had a chance to send Robyn out there against Hossa, but instead chose Adam.
"He turned around to me and gave me a look when I did it. I said, 'You go stop him now.' It was a good opportunity for him to learn more about his own ability and how to stop top players.
"He had a great shift and it helped his confidence."
I think Pardy has been pretty good since his terrible outing in Montreal. His game against Florida was particularly sound. His ES number according to behind the net are fairly strong (1.85 GAON/60, +15.4), which is all you can really ask of the kid.
- A paradox: Not a single flames player has a negative corsi rating, but only two of them are positive in terms of GF/GA (Glencross and Bourque). Calgary has the puck going in the right direction, clearly, but that's not showing up in goal differential. Does that challenge the utility of the corsi metric or is the team suffering through bad luck/bad goaltending?
- The Flames now have the 5th best PK (85.2%) in the league and the 12th best PP (19%). If they could get their 5on5 house in order, they could be a pretty damn good squad. Assuming the special teams results have some sustain to them, of course.
5 comments:
Not a single flames player has a negative corsi rating, but only two of them are positive in terms of GF/GA
I coach I used to talk to always lamented games where his team didn't "bear down" on its chances, and there have been more than a few games this season where I've felt overly frustrated about missed opportunities around the net, particularly at evens.
This could be one of those things that corrects over time, or it could be a lack of natural talent around the net.
Or, it could be a myth.
i think pardy has taken some major strides since becoming a regular. he started out invisibly steady and has progressed to notable hits, good stickwork and excellent man-on-man (the dude is HUGE). he's still making some mistakes but with his minutes going up that can only be expected.
PLUS he's making sarich look useful...
methinks warren peters gets the nod again.
methinks warren peters gets the nod again.
Sounds about right. Boyd goes up to fill a spot in the top 9, and Peters didn't make a fool of himself in New York.
As for lines, Glencross' absence screws things anyway , so why not this:
Bourque-Langkow-Iginla
power vs. power
Lombardi-Conroy-Moss
second toughs
Cammalleri-Boyd-Bertuzzi
Softer matchups, and be rigorous about it. Like Randy Carlyle in 06/07 with the Getzlaf line rigorous.
?-Nystrom-Roy
10 ES shifts max. Nystrom gets some extra time on the PK.
I think the Vandermeer injury is going to go down as one of the better things to happen to the club this year, because I doubt Pardy would have seen any more ice time, barring a surprise child birth by Elisha Cuthbert.
We'll see if the team can turn around the PP. I think that 12th place may be a bit misleading, because we seem to be in a regression to the mean phase right now.
I think the Vandermeer injury is going to go down as one of the better things to happen to the club this year,
it'll be interesting to see where vandy lines up when he gets back.... 4th line with nystrom and primeau/prust/roy ?
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