CALGARY – Climbing into eighth place in NHL scoring with a dandy backhand roof job while shorthanded, Andrew Mangiapane wasn’t nearly finished for the night.
Having already set up Blake Coleman with a world-class pass to open the evening’s proceedings, the Calgary Flames’ 29-goal scorer then tossed a no-look, behind-the-back dish to set up the game-tying goal with 27.3 seconds remaining on Thursday against the Montreal Canadiens.
He wouldn’t be seen again.
The Flames' best player all night long wasn’t included in either overtime trio before a Mikael Backlund turnover cost Calgary a chance to win a franchise record 12th consecutive game at home.
Ben Chiarot’s second of the game sent the bulk of 16,288 home baffled by how a bottom-feeding Canadiens club could stun the league’s hottest team.
“Penalties, turnovers – they cost you hockey games,” explained coach Darryl Sutter.
“This team is famous for that. I tried to break that out of them.”
For the most part he has, but Thursday’s 5-4 overtime loss saw the club stumble at a surprising time in its surge.
Yet, their sloppy, disjointed, undisciplined effort still saw the Flames squeak out a point.
As for looking at the bright side, Sutter wasn't showering Mangiapane with praise after what was one of the forward's best outings in a season full of 'em.
“He turned the puck over too many times,” was Sutter’s assessment of No. 88.
“Our top players did it a lot.”
Tough crowd.
Such is life in Calgary where the standards and expectations have risen almost as quickly as Mangiapane’s assault on the 30-goal mark.
Only seven players have more goals than him, leaving him in a tie with some lad up north named McDavid.
“He was outstanding for us today and probably got a point for us,” said Elias Lindholm, who scored the game-tying goal with the goalie pulled, thanks to Mangiapane’s pass.
“Overall, it was a bad game from our side. Mangy was our best player. We left Marky (Jacob Markstrom) out to dry and he made some big saves.
“Lately at home, even though we’ve been winning, we haven’t been wearing teams down like we did a couple weeks ago. We need to get back to that. That’s how we want to play. Wear teams down and play in the o-zone as much as possible. Right now we’re turning pucks over and playing too much up and down.”
Mangiapane checks in as one of the team’s best forecheckers, and his finish has turned heads all season long.
At the risk of splitting hairs, why was the kid with the hottest of hands replaced by Tyler Toffoli in overtime?
Sutter suggested Backlund was out there to win the faceoff, as he did, and then was to be replaced by Mangiapane on the fly.
It never got that far as Backlund gave the Habs the puck in their zone, leading to the 2-on-1 finished by Chiarot one minute into overtime.
On the one-year anniversary of his re-hiring in Calgary, there’s no doubt Sutter deserves endless praise for turning the franchise around (again) by pushing all the right buttons.
Few coaches manage the bench or a game better than the Jolly Rancher.
The Jack Adams should soon have his name on it.
But it’s fair to suggest the team’s top scorer deserves to be used as a top-four forward in extra time.
On this night, it might have helped the team avoid dropping its fifth straight overtime decision at home this year.
That said, this game could have been won in regulation had the Flames not given Montreal six power plays, including two 5-on-3s.
They only capitalized on one, but the damage was also done by prohibiting the Flames from rolling their four lines on an evening in which the fourth unit was shockingly effective.
“With the 5-on-3’s we were lucky to get out of both periods tied or up,” said Sutter, whose club carried a 3-2 lead into the third period.
“Those were all stick fouls. They remind me of some of the stick fouls in Vancouver. (The game-winning goal), it’s a turnover – you have to hang on to pucks three on three.
"Their defencemen had three goals and they were all on forwards’ turnovers.”
The Flames now face a Murderer’s Row of opponents, starting in Colorado on Saturday, followed by visits from Edmonton, Washington, Tampa, Detroit and then Colorado again.
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