Flames Visual Recap 23: Matthew Tkachuk scores game winner as Flames eke out 3–2 victory over Kings

The Calgary Flames kicked off a four-game road trip in Los Angeles to take on the Kings. It was the first edition of this season’s Matthew Tkachuk vs. Drew Doughty matchup, and the Flames were looking to keep their momentum going after a nice shootout win over the Penguins a few nights ago.

Darryl Sutter and Trevor Lewis were honoured by the Kings for their contributions to the Kings’ Stanley Cup wins in 2012 and 2014.

Game recap

The Flames had scored first in 18 of their 22 games of the season, but did not manage to do that in this one. An Alexander Edler point shot was beautifully tipped past Jacob Markstrom by Alex Iafallo just over four minutes into the first period. The Kings jumped out to the early lead, but the Flames answered back midway through the period.

Andrew Mangiapane, the NHL’s road goal scoring leader, added to his total with a power play marker. Five minutes later, Milan Lucic scored a signature Lucic five-hole goal, also on the power play, to give the Flames their first lead of the game. It was Lucic’s seventh goal of the season, and his 25th as a member of the Flames. James Neal scored just 24 goals as a member of the Oilers, just saying.

The Flames headed to the first intermission up by one goal.

Shortly into the second period, the Flames would double their lead off a beautiful snipe from Tkachuk. In pure Tkachuk fashion, he used Doughty as a screen to beat goaltender Cal Petersen.

Thanks for the screen Drew. pic.twitter.com/OQpMeoicHl
— Calgary Flames (@NHLFlames) December 3, 2021

He really is an angel.

With just under two minutes remaining in the second frame, Edler scored his 100th career goal to bring the Kings back to within one goal. The first two periods were fairly even between the two teams, but the Flames decided to kill off the entire third period in hopes of a win.

The tide massively tilted in the third period as a result, with the Kings owning the possession and scoring chances battle. They pushed hard but weren’t able to tie things up. Jacob Markstrom earned his ninth win of the season and was named the game’s first star.

Game visualizations are below!