May as well face it … the right team won.
David Rittich hung on heroically to give the Flames what looked to be a 1-0 win before William Nylander wrecked the party in his home town by scoring a goal with the goalie pulled and then again in overtime to give Toronto a 2-1 win.
For the Flames they were an Elias Lindholm goal post with an empty net away from salting away an improbable victory, but all in all three points in Toronto is a heck of a result given the state of the team when they arrived in Toronto.
Now on to Ottawa, a team that is no longer the easy points they presented early in the season.
For now situation critical is back to situation interesting?
The Line Up
Here’s a new one for you … no change at all to the Calgary Flames roster. No change in who is dressed. No change in who plays whom. No change. Refreshing!
The Flames coming off a solid road win in Toronto against the depleted Maple Leafs on Monday, were looking to sweep the mini series before heading to Ottawa to play the Senators. Geoff Ward relied heavily on his top three lines and top two pairings on Monday, partially due to the opponent, and of course also due to the excessive number of penalties called in both directions. He’ll be looking to get the bottom third of the roster into the game tonight.
The Cage
It’s amazing what a week can make to the fortunes of two players. With Monday’s shut out David Rittich has moved past Jacob Markstrom in pretty much all the common and advanced goalie statistics, something you wouldn’t have guessed ten days ago. But with the injured Markstrom getting pulled in back to back games and Rittich allowing only two goals in his last two starts combined things tightened up considerably.
Jacob Markstrom
Save percentage above average -0.322
David Rittich
Save percentage above average 0.299
The Blueline
No change on the blueline, with Mark Giordano and Rasmus Andersson in the first pairing, Noah Hanifin and Chris Tanev in the second, and Oliver Kylington and Juuso Valimaki in the third pairing. Or are they? On Monday Kylington and Valimaki only played a minute together, but were subbed in on other pairings clearly to avoid them being on the ice together without last change. Will be interesting to see if there’s more trust tonight.
Giordano – Andersson
46% xGF in 217 minutes
Hanifin – Tanev
61% xGF in 277 minutes
Kylington – Valimaki
49% xGF in 1 minute
Up Front
The Flames won on Monday night, but they got simply buried in terms of underlying stats, partially due to being up most of the night and score effects, but also a lot of running around in their own zone. As a result the metrics below show some pretty rough lines when it comes to play driving, though the sample size is very very small. Elias Lindholm centers Matthew Tkachuk and Andrew Mangiapane. The Lindholm/Tkachuk pair has really struggled in recent weeks after a solid start to the season. Sean Monahan in his second game back from injury centers Johnny Gaudreau and Sam Bennett. Mikael Backlund is the center for Milan Lucic and Dillon Dube, and finally Glen Gawdin between Joakim Nordstrom and Josh Leivo.
Tkachuk – Lindholm – Mangiapane
53% xGF in 60 minutes
Gaudreau – Monahan – Bennett
41% xGF in 57 minutes
Lucic – Backlund – Dube
39% xGF in 14 minutes
Nordstrom – Gawdin – Leivo
37% xGF in 4 minutes
The Start
Honestly … excellent.
A very motivated Toronto Maple Leaf team wasn’t able to get a whole lot going against a Calgary team that was ready to play.
The Flames carried the first five on five, but in a duplicate event to Monday night took way too many penalties in the first period with Rasmus Andersson, Josh Leivo and Noah Hanifin taking ticky tacky penalties.
Once again I get why they were all called, but I prefer hockey with flow, and would prefer less powerplays either way.
Rittich’s Performance
What can you say about the guy?
Calgary may have had a solid first period but they were in the fetal position in the second if not for the outstanding play by David Rittich.
Too much zone time, and too many odd man rushes, but Rittich was flawless in answering all the Toronto second period vollies.
Monday night he pitches a shut out and tonight he was even better. He was forced to make more ten bell saves, showed some Kiprusoff crease movement and was calm as a cucumber.
Had to feel for him with the way things went down at the end, but that doesn’t take away a thing from the goaltender’s night. He was almost directly responsible for three points in Toronto.
Going into the season with the big free agent signing in Jacob Markstrom I really felt Calgary would have or should have one of the best tandems in the league. With a top 5 starter, and another starter as a backup the strength in net is hard to deny.
Things didn’t start that way this season, but of late David Rittich is stepping up and providing the backbone that everyone expected.
Aggressive Penalty Kill
Really liked how aggressive the Flames were on the penalty kill tonight, even more so than their play in killing seven penalties on Monday night.
They were like a dog on a bone all night with penalty killers out numbering powerplay puck carriers and forcing turnovers and forced passes.
Toronto has a high octane powerplay, so you would have to think equally aggressive penalty kill against lesser teams would work at least as well.
Hopefully it’s something we see going forward.
Special Teams Battle
Neither team scored on the powerplay tonight.
And luckily we saw less from both units that on Monday night.
The Flames went 0/2 on the night and the Leafs went 0/4.
Overall both teams had only one high danger chance apiece as the penalty killing units ruled the day.
Oliver’s Second Night
Thought Oliver Kylington took a step forward from his play on Monday night.
He was just over ten minutes instead of the seven he saw in his first action of the game, but much more noticeable.
He blew a tire twice … once in the first period resulting in some sustained pressure from the Leafs, and then again in the third when it looked like he was going to use his skating to either setup or score a goal himself.
His underlying stats were similar at 35% which isn’t great, but then most of his teammates took it on the chin defensively.
All in all I’d stick with him as he seems to have turned the corner and has added something at least to that bottom pairing.
Counting Stats
Team Stats:
Shots – Flames 22 Leafs 39
Face Offs – Flames 39%
Special Teams – Flames 0/2 Leafs 0/4
Player Stats:
Points – All three of Matthew Tkachuk, Elias Lindholm and Andrew Mangiapane picked up a point, Mangiapane with the goal.
Plus/Minus – Only one Calgary player was a plus tonight, Juuso Valimaki.
Shots – Andrew Mangiapane led the team in shots on goal with five.
Fancy Stats
The Leafs were clearly the better team. The Flames had a solid first period, but then were pretty much in a free for all in their own zone the rest of the way. Five on five the Flames only had 41% of the shot attempts on period splits of 56%/35% and 33%. High danger chances five on five were 67% Toronto (12-6), and expected goals were 62% Toronto.
In all situations the Flames had 38% of the shot attempts, 28% of the high danger chances and 42% of the expected goals.
With the numbers above it will come as no surprise that the players individually got pretty much filled in. Only six players were at 50% or better led by Chris Tanev at 59%, his partner Noah Hanifin at 57%, and four players; Andrew Mangiapane, Elias Lindholm, Josh Leivo and Glen Gawdin at 50% on the nose. Three players finished under 30%, Juuso Valimaki at 24%, Rasmus Andersson at 24% and Mikael Backlund at 29%.
