Flames Visual Recap 71: Gaudreau reaches 99 points as Flames finally beat Sharks

For reasons known only to the Hockey Gods, the Calgary Flames have really struggled against the San Jose Sharks this season. With three regulation losses to the Sharks so far, the Flames looked to turn the tables on the road in San Jose.

Daniel Vladar got the start in net for the Flames, Juuso Valimaki and Connor Mackey entered the lineup in favour of Nikita Zadorov and Erik Gudbranson, and Brett Ritchie returned after what looked like a pretty bad injury earlier in the week.

Game recap

The Flames opened the scoring in the first period just over seven minutes in. Matthew Tkachuk stole the puck at the Sharks blueline and found himself all alone streaking towards the net. He buried it top shelf on the partial break for his 34th goal of the season.

Shortly afterwards, Nick Bonino expertly redirected an otherwise harmless looking shot to even things up at one. In the final minute of the first period, Trevor Lewis drove wide and tucked the puck past James Reimer to restore the Flames’ one-goal lead.

Elias Lindholm extended the lead to two goals with a signature one timer. It was his 37th goal of the season, getting closer to that 40 goal mark.

Logan Couture made things a bit interesting with a nice power play marker in the third period, but Lindholm scored an empty netter late to ice the game. Johnny Gaudreau assisted on the goal which gave him 99 points on the season, tying his career high.

The Flames won their first game against the Sharks this season and extended their winning streak to three games.

Data visualizations of the game are below!