The Calgary Flames (8-14-3) will play the second of their four straight road games early Friday as they face the defending Stanley Cup champions Florida Panthers (12-10-1).
Don't let the Panthers recent slump fool you.
While Florida may be two spots shy from the basement of the Eastern Conference, out of their 52 goals scored in even-strength hockey, 32 of them have come from high-danger shots (high-danger goals), comprising of 61.54% of their goals. That is the highest of any team so far. This Florida group does not rely on lucky bounces and "puck luck" and scores quality goals.
The only problem with Florida is that their shots on goals and 52 goals are the 13th-fewest. But that is still impressive considering their time on the ice in even-strength situations is the fourth-lowest in the league.
Regardless, Calgary can ill-afford to let Florida to get any lucky goals in starting now, considering the three goals scored by Tampa Bay two days before in the first six minutes of their game were not high-danger goals. The last of them was an own goal by Kevin Bahl.
The Flames' offence also did rebound back, putting up their highest number of high-danger scoring chances (HDCF) in a game (19) this season in even-strength situations. Calgary has gone three straight games (14 vs Stars, 10 vs Canucks, 19 vs Lightning) where they've put up double-digit HDCF . They almost made it four straight, but they were one short and put up nine against the Sabres. So close...
That shows this Flames team has found their mojo to put up quality shots now.
They'll be hoping to continue that against a Panthers' defence that allow the 10th-fewest high-danger scoring chances against (HDCA).
By the way, just to put it out there, in that same list, Tampa Bay allows the third-fewest HDCA, but the 19 that they gave up to Calgary was the most given up out of all of their (Lightnings') 23 games so far. Some food for thought...
While the Flames have given up the eighth-fewest HDCA in the league, they are in the midst of a six-game streak where they've given up at least seven HDCA. In three of these games, they've given up at least one high-danger goal, with three by Chicago in their Nov. 18 encounter.
Where the Panthers lack in even-strength TOI, they make up on the power play as their TOI in the man-advantage is the fourth-most (70:38) in the league in the month of November. Their power play percentage of 19.0% ranks them in the middle of the pack at 15th. Calgary's penalty kill percentage of 86.5% (32-for-37) is ranked eighth in the month of November. The team has also scored a shorthanded goal in each of the last two games.
It's the power play where the Flames struggle with, being the second-worst at 10.3% despite having the fifth-most PP TOI (67:22) this month. Florida's PK is ranked 17th.
The expected goalie for Calgary is Dustin Wolf who had a terrible start in the last game. But the Flames could also turn to Devin Cooley who has the lowest GAA (1.86) for netminders that have played at least seven games.
For the Panthers, two-time Vezina Trophy winner Sergei Bobrovsky is as good as they come. Although right now, his save percentage is under 0.900, which the Russian netminder has always put up by the end of seasons where he has played at least 31 games in his Hall of Fame NHL career. The other option Florida could go with is a less-tested Daniil Tarasov who has a record of 2-3-1, GAA of 2.45 and save percentage of 0.913.
Bottom Line
The quality shots for Calgary has only improved: they were 20th in HDCA before Oct. 19. Since then, they have the second-most and are now 11th. That has to continue against Florida and more importantly translate to goals.
This defence has allowed the 15th-most shots on goal this month, but they haven't been quality shots so the blue line should play as they they've always been doing.
The power play is a long shot but would love to see a successful score off one.
Penalty-kill and whoever is in net need to do their thing.
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