The Calgary Flames' seven-game winning streak came to an abrupt halt this past weekend as the Flames dropped a pair of games to St. Louis and Detroit.
They can get back on track and enter the holiday break on a positive note with a win tonight over the Winnipeg Jets.
The Jets have struggled a lot of late and they were in action last night so the Flames appear to be catching them at the right time.
Still, the Jets' roster closely resembles the one that led them to a playoff spot just a year ago so they are not a team that can be taken lightly.
Empty the tank, hope for a positive result and enter the break feeling good about yourself.
LINEUPS Gaudreau - Monahan - Colborne Bennett - Backlund - Ferland Raymond - Granlund - Hudler Bouma - Stajan - Jones
Giordano - Brodie Russell - Hamilton Engelland - Wideman
Ramo
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Ladd - Little - Wheeler Perrault - Scheifele - Stafford Thorburn - Burmistov - Ehlers Halischuk - Copp - Armia
Trouba - Byfuglien Enstrom - Myers Stuart - Chiarot
Hellebuyck
NOTES 1) Discipline is not the Jets' strength. They can be prone to taking careless penalties and that has killed them given their penalty kill has struggled mightily this season (they rank 27th in PK%). If the Flames use fresh legs to their advantage and stick to their game they should get plenty of power play opportunities. They'll just have to convert.
2) At 5 v 5 the Jets generate 59% of the shot attempts, 60% of the scoring chances and 68% of the goals with Perrault - Scheifele - Stafford on the ice. That's a unit the Flames need to pay special attention to.
3) Sam Bennett played a season low 10:12 last time out. Was that Bob Hartley sending a message or an indication of what we'll see going forward?
Hopefully for Flames fans the latter is not the case because Bennett leads the team in high-danger scoring chances at 5 v 5 this year. For the most part he's playing well and it's only a matter of time before he breaks out. He can't do that logging 10 minutes a night.
The game is at 9:00 eastern and can be seen on TSN3 and Sportsnet-West.
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