Flames Game Recaps

Flames Visual Recap 69: Johnny Gaudreau powers Calgary to big win over LA, nice

On a three-game losing skid, the Calgary Flames were on the road to face the Los Angeles Kings. It was a big game as the Kings’ recent hot streak has them in second place in the Pacific Division. These two points were important, and both teams came to play. Adam Ruzicka drew into the lineup as Calle Jarnkrok is still dealing with a non-covid illness.

Game recap

Just 10 seconds into the game, the Flames opened the scoring off a hilarious bank-in goal from Johnny Gaudreau. Off the initial dump in after the opening faceoff, Calvin Petersen was out of position in his crease, and Gaudreau fired it right at his skates hoping for a favourable deflection. His goal tied the fourth fastest goal in Flames franchise history, and the good guys were up by one early.

However, the first period did not end up going the Flames’ way. They played well for most of the period, outshooting and out possessing the Kings, but Adrian Kempe scored two goals, the latter coming on the power play late in the period, to give the Kings a 2-1 lead after 20 minutes of play.

The Flames came back hard in the second period, though, and it was on the back of Gaudreau that they got back into the game. He fed a pass to Elias Lindholm midway through the period to even things up, and then scored himself on a beautiful backhand that went top shelf to give the Flames the lead once again.

That marker ended up being the game winner as the Flames grinded out a scoreless third period to earn a crucial regulation victory over the Kings. The Flames’ penalty kill was on fire the whole night going 5/6.

Data visualizations of the game are below.

Game events

All situations corsi

Check out our tutorial on how to plot an NHL rink using R with the full code and customisation options included!

5v5 corsi

Shifts

Do you have any feedback or suggestions? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter @wincolumnCGY.

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