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The title says it all – the Calgary Flames are expected to be fighting for a lotto pick this year and the Flames brass are sick of hearing it.
Not willing to go about a rebuild like certain other Western conference teams, those involved within the Flames organization refuse to accept defeat despite going into the season with a young and inexperienced team.
"We're going to play hard. We're going to compete hard," Feaster stated. "We're going to go out there with the expectation of winning. We are not going to go out with the expectation of, 'Oh, we're young,' or, 'Oh, we're rebuilding and therefore results don't matter.' Results do matter."
It has been a style of hockey which I’ve often written about that coach Bob Hartley is looking to employ – hard working, physical hockey. He knows this team is short of top end talent, he understands what the organization’s main goal is at this point…but that doesn’t change what his role with the club is, and that’s to win hockey games.
It should be no surprise to anyone that the Flames will struggle to get a couple extra W’s this year, though I think many are expecting the team to roll over and let others take the win from them night in, night out. Given the way that the preseason and training camp has gone with this particular squad, it doesn’t appear that this will be the case.
With a few key veterans remaining such as Mike Cammalleri, Curtis Glencross, Lee Stempniak, and Jiri Hudler, the Flames still have plenty of veteran experience who can put away a few points. Add to that a few talented rookies such as Sven Baertschi, Sean Monahan, and even Mikael Backlund, and the team could have some strong secondary scoring as well.
The Flames have added some size and depth to their bottom six as well to grind out the opposition in the likes of David Jones, Lance Bouma, and Tim Jackman, and they also have the heavy weight Brian MacGrattan to take care of any extra rough stuff. Heck even Matt Stajan has bought into Hartley's style and dropped the mitts during the preseason.
Defensively, the team will ice a few strong veteran players in Dennis Wideman and Mark Giordano, in addition to a strong skating rookie in TJ Brodie. The Flames brought in some extra size and muscle on the backend by acquiring Shane O’Brien and appear to be giving as much time as needed for heavy hitting rookie Pat Sieloff to make an impression to not only his team and coaching staff, but round the NHL as well.
"We expect that the whole will be greater than the sum of its parts and we'll be known by our work ethic. It's not a matter of how many times we get knocked down. It's about how many times we get back up and we keep moving forward. That is what we're going to focus on.
If many of you recall, I wrote a blog a few months ago about the subjectivity of just what a “rebuilds” means to people. There is no right way to rebuild a team and there is no specific set of rules or guidelines that one should follow to elicit guaranteed success. It just doesn’t exist. With that being said, the Flames continue to maintain that they will develop their club around players who want to work hard and win…they don’t have time for people who feel that they can afford to lose games, at any time.
The team message seems to be pretty clear – we have an 82 game schedule to play and we’re going to play every last game with heart, passion, and hard work. If you don’t like it, we can find you somewhere else to play.
"We expect the young kids to play well. We expect our veterans to play well. There are a lot of question marks on this hockey team but again, we're going to battle. We will be known by our work ethic. Bob (Hartley) and I have talked about it. Brian (Burke) and I have talked about it. Guys that don't want to work hard won't be part of it."
By no way do I expect this team to come out and compete for a playoff spot this year; however I do not expect this team to be walked on, either. If the team can find any success this year it will be knowing that they give it their all, that they were very hard to play against, and won the respect of fans and coaches from around the league with their dedication.
The Calgary Flames have a few bright spots coming up through the system, and they are playing just a few this year. The Flames will continue to get stronger and if this team remains on track as they’ve displayed over the past two years, they should be back to burning W’s into the score sheet sooner than expected.
That’s all for today, enjoy your weekends!
Calgary Flames Blogger • 
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