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Last time out, the Calgary Flames put forth arguably their best performance of the season yet came away without a point.
They'll be looking to duplicate that effort -- but with a different result -- tonight when they host the Detroit Red Wings in the sixth of seven consecutive home games.
Many, myself included, expected the Red Wings to be a lottery team this season but they're surprisingly off to a respectable 8-7-1 start.
They've played one more game than Calgary, but I think it's fair to say nobody expected the Red Wings to have more points and a better goal differential than the Flames this far into the year.
Their underlyings are *decent*, too, with the team sitting 17th in Corsi For% and 23rd in Scoring Chance For% (it's worth noting one percentage point would move them up to 15th).
I don't think the Red Wings are anything special, but they're not as big of a pushover as I would have expected so the Flames will need to earn a win tonight. Detroit (probably) isn't going to hand it to them.
Here are the projected lineups:
Calgary
Johnny Gaudreau - Sean Monahan - Michael Ferland
Matthew Tkachuk - Mikael Backlund - Michael Frolik
Sam Bennett - Mark Jankowski - Jaromir Jagr
Kris Versteeg - Curtis Lazar - Troy Brouwer
Mark Giordano - Dougie Hamilton
T.J. Brodie - Michael Stone
Brett Kulak - Rasmus Andersson
Mike Smith
Detroit (via DailyFaceoff.com)
Anthony Mantha - Henrik Zetterberg - Gustav Nyquist
Tomas Tatar - Dylan Larkin - Justin Abdelkader
Darren Helm - Frans Nielsen - Luke Glendening
Martin Frk - Andreas Athanasiou - David Booth
Jonathan Ericsson - Trevor Daley
Xavier Ouellet - Mike Green
Nikla Kronwall - Nick Jensen
Petr Mrazek
Five things to watch:
1) Smith struggled the last couple times out allowing nine goals on 51 shots and allowing some big rebounds that normally weren't there earlier in the year. He seems to have lost some of his sharpness -- perhaps due to fatigue -- so it's important the Flames make life easy on him tonight so he can regain his footing.
2) In almost 100 minutes together at 5v5, the Ouellet - Green pairing has been an absolute disaster. They're controlling just 43% of the attempts and less than 31%(!!!) of the chances. Glen Gulutzan should target them with the top unit.
3) Speaking of the top unit, Ferland's recent play suggests he's anything but a passenger on that line. Over the last seven games, he has 20 chances and six points at 5v5.
4) The 3M line is always good, but they've taken it up a notch of late as they've been completely dominant against the likes of Sidney Crosby and Brock Boeser, who failed to record a chance for the first time in the Calgary game. The 3M line will have another good test in this one against Anthony Mantha, one of the best, young, offensive wingers in the league, Henrik Zetterberg, and Gustav Nyquist.
5) Andersson will be making his season debut alongside Kulak on the third pairing. Given how well he played in the AHL, and how poorly Matt Bartkowski has been, I think this was the right decision. If Andersson can string together some solid showings while Travis Hamonic is sidelined, it may be tough to take him back out.
Puck drop is just after 9:00 eastern and can be seen on SNF and FS-D.
Recent posts:
Five takeaways from Calgary vs Vancouver
Six takeaways from Calgary's shootout win over New Jersey
Smith, 3M line lead Flames to win over Penguins
Calgary Flames Blogger • 
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