While the long face of Lance Bouma was tied to one specific play, the sentiment really summed up the Calgary Flames’ entire experience through two games with the Anaheim Ducks.
Frustration. Disbelief. Dismay.
Bouma and his teammates appeared well positioned to leave southern California with a split in their first-round encounter with the Ducks. Instead, Anaheim holds a 2-0 series lead after winning Game 2 at the Honda Center 3-2 on Saturday night thanks largely to a fortuitous bank off Bouma’s skate with just 4:44 left in the third period.
The play came about with Flames defenceman Dougie Hamilton serving a penalty for holding Corey Perry’s stick. When Ducks captain Ryan Getzlaf tried to whip a pass through the high slot, the puck caromed off Bouma’s right skate, skipped into the air and fluttered past Brian Elliott as the goaltender slid helplessly to his right.
“It’s just an unlucky bounce,” said Bouma, who was only struck by the puck because he was in the proper position to break up a pass. “It’s unfortunate. There’s not much else you can say about it; it’s unlucky.”
While the Flames could only shake their head at the bad break, they were also a little miffed about the call that put them down a man in the first place.
“I thought the standard changed in the last six minutes,” said coach Glen Gulutzan. “I thought there was some holding going on at the end of the second when we were in the O-zone. [Calgary left-winger] Alex Chiasson’s stick is being held by a defenceman laying on the ground.”
As for Hamilton — who’s taken four minor penalties in this series — he also believed it was more a case of two players jostling for position while moving down the ice.
[snippet id=3332601]
“I think it’s a tough call to change the outcome of the game, such a good game,” he said.
And that’s the thing; for the second outing in a row, there was so much to like about the proceedings from Calgary’s perspective. Just as they did in Game 1, when Getzlaf opened the scoring 52 seconds into the night, the Flames dug themselves a rut in Game 2, this time falling behind 2-0 on goals by Jakob Silfverberg and Rickard Rakell. When Matthew Tkachuk took a four-minute high-sticking penalty late in the first, it seemed like Anaheim might blow the doors open.
Instead, Mikael Backlund scored a beautiful short-handed goal with 1:36 remaining in the first, going backhand-forehand to deke out Ducks goalie John Gibson. In the middle frame, the Flames exhibited some great passing on the power play, culminating with a soft one-touch pass from Johnny Gaudreau that Sean Monahan slammed into the net for his second tally of the series. That was one of 15 second-period shots by Calgary, which fired 37 pucks toward Gibson compared to the 29 directed at Elliott.
“I think we could have won the game,” said Gulutzan. “It was a close game, a hard-fought game.”
Sam Bennett was certainly giving a solid effort when, as part of the Flames’ second-period dominance, he drove the net hard on a play that eventually saw a centring pass from Kris Versteeg end up in the net. The potential goal, though, was negated when the officials determined Bennett had interfered with Gibson. Gulutzan did not look like he was satisfied with the explanation in the moment and was no less befuddled after the game.
“I don’t know anymore,” he said of the standard for goalie interference. “I don’t know what the rule is.”
Pucks ricocheting into the net on one-in-100 bounces, 50-50 goal calls going the wrong way; maybe there really is a curse for Calgary in this building, where the Flames haven’t won a game since April of 2006.
[snippet id=3317575]
“We don’t think about that,” said Hamilton. “It’s just a hockey game to us, just an unfortunate outcome, my responsibility on the penalty.”
How they got in this hole is immaterial for the Flames now. There’s some solace in the fact they’ll play the next two games at home, and maybe a little more rooted in how well they showed for so much of Game 2.
“I thought we did a ton of good things,” Giordano said.
The rewards better kick in soon, though, because the Flames are running out of race track.
[relatedlinks]
