Edmonton Oilers Potential Playoff Opponents: Calgary Flames
By Phil Gretzky
This blog is second of a mini-series I’m writing(here is the first) – there’s only a few games left in the Edmonton Oilers season so let’s take a look at some of the opponents we might face in both the division and the conference.
I see this as more of a second round series than a first rounder, as the way the NHL playoffs work nowadays if the Flames as expected finish first in the division, they will play the wild card team with the better record in the first round (Colorado, who may win the President’s Trophy and still has the superior record, would draw the wild card team with the worse record). At this point in time that looks like Nashville.
Despite the team’s success this year, I see Calgary as more pretenders than contenders. History is not on their side, either, as the C truly stands for choke. For most of their existence the Flames have been a middling team, rarely making the playoffs in consecutive years and when they do never making progress past the first or second round – and that’s when they DO make the playoffs. They can never seem to get any sustained success going for years on end. They’ve only made the Cup finals twice in their existence – 1989 and 2004, winning in ’89 and losing to Tampa Bay in ’04.
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This year’s edition of the Flames exhibits mainly magic weaved by Darryl Sutter. Some people might see a team led by two guys who are still top 10 in scoring in the NHL – Johnny Gaudreau just cracked the 100 point mark for the first time in his career for fourth in the league at the time of this writing while Mr. Turtle himself, Matthew Tkachuk, sixth in the league with 92 points.
However, if you look closer at their stats, you’ll see their top four scorers are all eclipsing their career shooting percentages in the same year, some by as much as 5%. Does that seem sustainable to you? It sure doesn’t to me. Seriously, look it up if you don’t believe me.
A bad omen for the future is the contracts of both Gaudreau and Tkachuk are up after this season and neither guy has signed an extension. To me that says they don’t believe in the future of this franchise and would rather go somewhere else than spin their wheels in Calgary.
Personally my money would be on Tkachuk lobbying to go to Ottawa so he can play with his brother Brady on a team that’s on the upswing. But that’s a topic for a Flames blogger. 🙂
Another thing to keep in mind about the over-hyped Flames is Jacob Markstrom is playing out of his mind this season, but at the age of 32 and having only his second season of elite numbers in 13 seasons, how sustainable do you think that is? Not very.
For now we’re going to focus on the playoffs for this season. If you look at PDO stats, Calgary may be starting to cool off already in terms of puck luck. Early on in the season, they were the third luckiest team in the league, and although they’ve slipped to 10th, puck luck is still on their side. The Oilers, meanwhile, have been on the par side to below par in puck luck for most of the season.
So that begs the question – which team will have more sustained success? Calgary or Edmonton? It’s the Oilers, no question. They’re the team that’s much more for real than Calgary is because they’re in a playoff spot more thanks to sound tactical play rather than puck luck and relying on career years from their key players. Also let’s not forget their two best players have already been locked up to long term extensions, something the Flames cannot say…..
Assuming Calgary doesn’t get upset by Nashville – and it could happen but Nashville is a beatable team – they’ll probably draw the Oilers in the second round.
How do the Oilers stack up? Pretty well, actually.