Calgary Flames Need to Play a More Disciplined Style
By Ryan Ritchie
Calgary Flames are off to a slow start under new head coach Glen Gulutzan. While goaltending has once again been a concern, it’s undisciplined play that is ultimately killing this team early on.
Off to a slow start with a 1-3-1 record, the Calgary Flames are experiencing similar issues to the start of last season. In fact, their tandem of Brian Elliott and Chad Johnson has managed to put up just slightly worse numbers than that of Jonas Hiller/Karri Ramo/Joni Ortio in 2015-16 around this time.
While goaltending is certainly a concern, it’s not the part of Calgary‘s game that fans should be worried about. Once the defense tightens up and both Elliott/Johnson settle in a little more, the play between the pipes should be solid.
Truth be told, it makes little sense to blame the goaltending. Teams such as Edmonton and Ottawa are going through the exact same issue, yet still managing to pile up wins due to outscoring their opponent. Unfortunately for Calgary, it’s difficult to outscore the opposition when you spend nearly one-quarter (1/4) of a game killing penalties.
By the Numbers
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While most teams have spent between 13 to 33 minutes on the penalty kill (total time this season), two teams stand above the rest. The 1-3-1 Anaheim Ducks have spent 43:57 killing penalties, while receiving 33:29 in power play time for a pp/pk difference of -10.28. Calgary ranks 2nd worst at 42:31 total penalty kill time (3rd placed St. Louis has only spent 33:07 on the PK), but has received more PP time than any other team at 39:57 through five games.
You probably shouldn’t be spending 2:34 seconds extra/game on the PK when you’re leading the league by a country mile in time on the man advantage. That’s a serious red flag folks.
Thursday Night
If you hadn’t realized that discipline was an issue prior to Thursday’s game, that match-up against the Hurricanes put an exclamation mark on the issue. It began early in the first period with the likes of Lance Bouma and Alex Chiasson. The boneheaded play by Chiasson continued late in the third period when he took a high sticking penalty with two and half minutes remaining. If that wasn’t bad enough, Troy Brouwer took a hooking call with 57 seconds left, which led to a Jeff Skinner power play goal to help seal the game.
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What’s the Answer?
The answer is really quite simple. If guys don’t want to play disciplined or be careful with their sticks, Glen Gulutzan needs to shorten his bench. No that doesn’t mean reward Chiasson and Brouwer with top-six minutes. If it means making room for Matthew Tkachuk, Michael Frolik, or Kris Versteeg in the top-six (regardless of previous performance), then so be it.
Given the circumstances, there’s no reason why the Calgary Flames shouldn’t be a perfect 5-0 having spent so much extra time on the man advantage.
It might be time for the Flames new bench boss to send a loud message to some of his players if he hopes to get the ship headed in the right direction.