When the Calgary Flames officially open training camp it will be 136 days since the team’s latest playoff meltdown.
With the team’s core intact following an off-season in which the goalie position received the only shakeup, the Flames will get to work on their latest attempt to answer the biggest question looming over the group: can this team get over the sizeable playoff hump that has plagued the franchise since 2004?
That question obviously can’t be answered until the spring, but to follow are the three biggest questions the coaching staff hopes to have answered in camp.
Current Cap Space: $223,334
GM: Brad Treliving
Head coach: Geoff Ward
Assistants: Ryan Huska, Martin Gelinas, Ray Edwards
Unsigned players: None
1. Who will play down the middle?
There threatens to be a significant logjam of capable centres who could be jockeying for position in camp after Geoff Ward revealed in the fall he’d like to try both Elias Lindholm and Sam Bennett up the middle.
Lindholm is considered to be the Flames most complete forward and has played plenty of centre over the years. However, his chemistry with Sean Monahan and Johnny Gaudreau over the last two years in Calgary made it hard to move him from their right side. After another ineffective playoff next to them it’s time he moved.
Bennett was drafted at centre but hadn’t been able to prove his worth there until the summer when his latest playoff heroics came with him up the middle.
What is hard to fathom is both of them proving good enough to unseat one of Monahan, Mikael Backlund or Derek Ryan, especially since the latter is the perfect fourth line pivot.
Flexibility and depth are two of the Flames’ biggest strengths up front, as almost every forward can play multiple positions. Even if Lindholm and/or Bennett seem to prove worthy of starting the season at centre, it’s a good bet they’ll also see time on the wing moving forward in a 56-game sprint bound to include endless injuries and roster moves.
Let the battle begin.
2. Who will run the Flames' powerplay?
Mark Giordano has done an admirable job doing this for years, helping him win the Norris Trophy two seasons back. However, at age 37 the Flames would like to ease the burden on the man who annually eats more minutes than anyone on the roster.
In that vein the Flames acquired Erik Gustafsson at last season’s trade deadline to run the top power-play unit in the playoffs. The Swedish puck mover did so admirably, but is gone now, leaving Giordano and his likely partner, Rasmus Andersson, to battle for the top special teams gig.
The Flames deploy just one defenceman per unit, making it likely the two will simply alternate.
TJ Brodie had long played significant power play minutes, but with his departure to Toronto Andersson is the next man up by virtue of his poise, puck-moving ability and a cannon of a shot.
Don’t be surprised if Noah Hanifin also opens the year with the odd power play assignment.
By year’s end many expect future blue line boss Juuso Valimaki may just prove capable enough to earn some power play time.
3. Who will play alongside Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan?
If indeed Lindholm moves to the middle, the Flames’ long-time power couple will be in need of a complimentary piece. It says here the job is custom made for Sam Bennett, who could potentially share faceoff duties with Monahan, like Lindholm used to.
However, another strong possibility is Canada’s former World Junior team captain Dillon Dube, who many believe will thrive following his breakout in last year’s playoffs. Dube can line up on either wing and can play many different roles, as he proved on the third line last summer when he crashed, banged and scored on the team’s third unit alongside Milan Lucic and Bennett.
Newcomers Josh Leivo and Dominik Simon are also candidates for a look as Leivo has exhibited some scoring touch the last two seasons, and the word out of Pittsburgh is that Sidney Crosby raved about having Simon retrieve pucks on his top line.
