The Calgary Flames six-game road trip was destined to be make or break for the 2024–25 campaign. It was either going to signal the team needs to sell off assets and continue their re-tool, or prove they are not pretenders and make adjustments before the deadline.
Instead, the Flames did the most Flames thing possible by going 2–2–2. Not good enough to distance themselves in the race, but not bad enough to be sellers.
The Flames may hold the final playoff spot by a single point, but in terms of points percentage they fall behind the Vancouver Canucks.
It’s just perpetual mediocrity.
The frustrating part was that the Flames showed a ton of promise against one of the best teams in the NHL. They had every reason to throw in the towel and they didn’t.
The reason they lost was because of Ryan Huska and his perplexing, confusing, and irresponsible decisions around the deployment of his players.
What is Ryan Huska thinking?
Huska has gotten a lot of praise in Calgary the last few seasons for several different reasons. The main one is that many are attributing the team’s “success” this season to his coaching, when in reality, it has been 100% due to the strong goaltending of Dustin Wolf and sometimes Dan Vladar.
Mismanaging Zary
The last few days, though, there has been a ton of heat around Huska’s handling of Connor Zary, one of the team’s most dynamic offensive players. Starting him on the fourth line against Philadelphia, many questioned why Zary of all players received the demotion. He responded with two goals, one of which was not even with his linemates on the fourth line, before immediately receiving shifts higher in the lineup. Everyone started praising Huska for the decision as if it somehow made the difference.
Huska himself even seemed to laugh off criticism of putting him on the fourth line, saying that it doesn’t matter where he plays.
One would assume that Zary would be promoted after such a performance, right? Nope. Zary was again on the fourth line and against the Stars played the third least out of forwards despite being a +1 in the game. It’s criminal to laugh off questioning around his demotion of Zary, to only then completely demote him the very next game.
Overtime madness
Lana Del Ray, you might have summertime sadness, but Huska has overtime madness.
Zary’s individual usage aside, how Huska handled the Flames overtime period is inexcusable.
During the extra frame, Huska’s lineup decisions bordered on pure delusion. Starting Joel Hanley off the draw before immediately taking him off was a big brain move that was not needed. He then decided to ice Nazem Kadri and Jonathan Huberdeau nearly every second shift, which in the end resulted in them being on the ice for the game-winning goal after running on fumes.
But that being said, it wasn’t about who he played, it was about who he didn’t.
Joel Farabee had one of his best games in a Flames uniform, including a Goal of the Year candidate to open the scoring. You’d assume he’d get one shift, right? Wrong.
Zary, who was coming off a two-goal performance and scored in overtime earlier this year, would surely get a shift? Also wrong.
Huska seemed to think he was only allowed to ice the same six players without reaching into his bench at the end of a long road trip. Surely one of the two players above would have given you a chance to win?
A coach’s loss
Make no mistake, the overtime loss to close out the road trip is on Huska and no one else. The team deserved more, especially when heading into the NHL Trade Deadline. The front office is going to think they need to spend assets to solve a scoring problem, but the real problem is behind the bench refusing to put players who can score on the ice when the team needs it.
