Will Flyers Answer the ‘Wakeup Call' in Calgary?

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Thursday night's
2-0 loss to a lowly Edmonton Oilers team marked an 18-game stretch in
which the Flyers haven't won two straight. While that points to a slew
of questions facing the team as they look down the barrels of the trade
deadline, something we'll get into in more detail tomorrow, the loss
itself seemed to be particularly alarming. We don't have to look much
further than Peter Laviolette's reaction to see that.

But while blasting his team's effort in conceding two Edmonton goals
in a flat second period, Lavvy quickly grasped for the positive
straw—hoping the loss was a wakeup call for a playoff-bound team. In
other words, Lavvy is with the rest of us in hoping that in a few weeks,
we'll be looking at Thursday night as the team's rock bottom. Only time
will tell, but their effort needs to improve dramatically, starting
tonight against the Calgary Flames.

For the Flames, every game could mean the difference between making
or missing the playoffs. They're currently among three Western
Conference teams with 66 points, all of which are two points behind the
eight-seeded Dallas Stars. The Los Angeles Kings are among them, and as
you probably heard, they just made a deal aiming to spark their offense
enough to pull ahead of that pack.

Calgary is coming off a pair of home losses including a 6-1
trouncing by the Oilers and a shootout against the Phoenix Coyotes. They
too are in need of a wakeup call if they hope to avoid an early date
with the tee box.

The Flames are basically an unremarkable team, on the low end of the
goals-per-game table at 26th in the league, while only 12th in goals
against. Their power play is currently 15th (17.1%), though they have a
top-10 killing unit (83.5%).

Like the Oilers, we don't often see the Flames. However, they do
sport some familiar faces. Olli Jokinen leads the team in points and
being weird-looking, and he's dangerous in his ability to score and get
the Flyers to make mistakes including taking penalties. Jarome Iginla
once again leads the team in goals, sitting on 23. Both players have
four points in their last five games. Mikka Kiprusoff holds down the
fort in net, currently posting a 2.31 GAA and .922 save percentage, both
quite a bit better than his career marks. He's allowed eight goals over
his previous two starts, including five in 40 minutes against Edmonton,
but he shut out the Kings the game before that. Not that the Kings are
tearing up scoresheets lately, but after the Flyers were blanked by Some
Guy, here's hoping for better luck tonight.

The Flyers beats are tweeting about a possible Braydon Coburn
absence from the lineup tonight. No other lineup notes available just
yet, and we're headed out for some chili and beers before settling in
for the west-coast start. 

Late 10:00 pm start from Calgary this evening.

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