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Oct
Thoughts after the home opener
By Joshua
Just a few quick hitters after tonight’s game:
- Looks like Kipper and Phaneuf are back on form. Two of the three Canuck goals off of deflections and the other after a bad clearing attempt. 39 saves in the winning effort is a promising start. Phaneuf seems to be playing with that edge he was lacking last season.
- Coach Sutter said he likes to keep shots against to around 25. We’ve got a ways to go to get that. The guys need to be stronger on the clearing attempts, better at clearing rebounds, and more effective at getting into shooting lanes. I’m seeing a lot of guys going to block shots, but most of the chances still getting through.
- At 2-for-3, the powerplay is showing big improvements.
- Already getting good value from the depth guys. Bourque, Dawes, Prust, Sjostrom, Nystrom, Pardy, and Giordano all found the scoresheet tonight.
- Still can’t believe we picked Dawes off of waivers. I think this guy’s underrated and could do this year what Bourque did last year.
Hopefully we can see more of the hockey that was played in those first 20 minutes consistently this season. If we play like that against the Oil on Sunday, it’ll be a whitewash. Make it so, boys.
October 3rd, 2009 at 11:37 am
I was so impressed with the third and fourth lines in the first game of the season. The concept of “Scoring by Committee” was displayed perfectly by the Flames team tonight.
Everyone seems to be concerned with the Flames offense this year after the departure of Cammalleri. I don’t foresee any problems. We’ve replace Cammalleri with Jokinen, picked up one of the league’s most offensive defensemen in Jay Bouwmeester, and our third and fourth lines are looking great. I don’t think offense will be a major concern for the Calgary Flames this year.
October 9th, 2009 at 12:56 am
I’m not sure that I totally buy Bouwmeester being one of the league’s top offensive defencemen. Looking at last year’s stats, he’s ranked 23rd among defencemen in scoring. Playing with a barely non-playoff team he’s behind Bieksa, Gilbert, and Keith in the scoring department.
The one stat of his that I think really stood out from last year is his 27 minutes per game of ice time. He’s a workhorse who can handle a ton of time against the top units of opposing teams.
We’ve got a very solid two-way defenceman in J-Bo, but I don’t think we can expect to see him generating a whole bunch of offence. Luckily we’ve got all-stars like Bourque and Nystrom to look after that for us.