Welcome to this week’s Calgary Flames playoff check-in. This week saw very little movement in the standings, as the St. Louis Blues have hit a new gear and still occupy the second wild card spot in the West. The Flames were riding a four-game winning streak, posting a very respectable 3–1–0 record on their Eastern road trip and winning a thriller against the Seattle Kraken at home.
However, the Dallas Stars snapped their winning streak last night by a score of 5–2. It was a frustrating loss where Calgary was outplaying Dallas for a majority of the game, but goaltending would end up being the difference maker.
This week’s playoff picture
After the Flames’ loss against the Stars, here’s what their updated playoff odds look like for this week:
| Site | Playoff Odds |
|---|---|
| MoneyPuck | 18.5% |
| Hockey-Reference | 18.2% |
| PlayoffStatus.com | 16% |
With the Blues riding an eight-game winning streak at just the perfect time, it’s understandable why this week’s odds are so low for the Flames. Calgary has 11 games left in the regular season, and being six points back is not an easy task to overcome.
The upcoming schedule for the Flames is interesting. Their next four games will be against the Edmonton Oilers, Colorado Avalanche, Utah Hockey Club, and Anaheim Ducks. There are some winnable games over the next week but for the Flames, they need to treat every match like it’s a game seven at this stage. They also need to hope that the Blues start losing some games here, but that team is clearly dead set on making the postseason, and a big slip on their end is looking unlikely.
Where the others are at
As for the full wild card race for this week, it looks like the following:
| Team | Points |
|---|---|
| St. Louis (in wild card spot) | 85 |
| Vancouver | 80 |
| Calgary | 79 |
| Utah | 75 |
Here are the odds for the other teams to make the postseason, as well as their next few matchups:
St Louis: 72.3% Next opponents: @ Avalanche, vs Red Wings, vs Penguins
Vancouver: 16.3% Next opponents: @ Blue Jackets, @ Jets, vs Kraken
Utah: 1.33% Next opponents: @ Panthers, @ Blackhawks, vs Flames, vs Kings
