Flames Visual Recap 53: Calgary tops Vancouver with multipoint efforts from Lindholm and Tkachuk

With both the Calgary Flames and Vancouver Canucks out of playoff contention, the final four game series they are set to play against each other doesn’t do much beyond setting draft lottery odds. For Calgary, it could be a chance to see some of their prospects log bigger minutes, but Darryl Sutter had other plans in mind as the Flames topped the Canucks with a final score of 4-1.

For starters, the Flames should be playing the likes of Adam Ruzicka and Connor Mackey in all remaining games, on top of playing Juuso Valimaki and Oliver Kylington, but this wasn’t the case as Michael Stone was slotted into the lineup to the detriment of Valimaki. At least Glenn Gawdin dressed, though he played just 8:47, the lowest of all players in the game.

The contest opened up with Vancouver scoring on their first shot as Matthew Highmore tipped in Travis Hamonic‘s shot past Jacob Markstrom to get the early lead just 1:02 into the opening period. However, the Flames quickly responded and got a lead of their own with Rasmus Andersson scoring an easy goal courtesy of a Johnny Gaudreau feed through the slot, then Andrew Mangiapane tipped in Nikita Nesterov‘s point shot shortly after.

No further goals would be scored until the final few minutes of the game, where Elias Lindholm and Matthew Tkachuk extended the Flames’ lead to three goals. Lindholm scored on a break where he cleanly beat Thatcher Demko glove-side with a perfectly placed shot. Tkachuk had a pass attempt during the Flames’ power play that ended up being a fortuitous tip, going off of J.T. Miller‘s stick into the net.

Three games against Vancouver remain in the Flames’ schedule, and the most heated storyline of these games at this point will be which Flames will dress for which games. We’ll see how it all unfolds soon enough.

Check out the game visualisations below.