The Florida Panthers (18-10-2) will pay a visit to old friends Jonathan Huberdeau, MacKenzie Weegar, Ryan Lomberg and the rest of Calgary Flames (14-11-5) tonight at Scotiabank Saddledome in the middle tilt of a five-game road trip against Western Conference foes.
For the second straight season, the Panthers were blanked by the same 4-0 score at Rogers Arena by the Vancouver Canucks in their last outing, ending a seven-game point streak that started with a 5-1 win over Toronto on November 27. Evan Rodrigues had a game-high five shots on goal and Aleksander Barkov, whose seven-game scoring streak came to end, registered four shots in the loss.
While the Cats were losing in Vancouver, the Flames got routed 8-3 by the visiting Tampa Bay Lightning, who scored four times in the third period, on Thursday. After a surprisingly good start to the season, fading Calgary is just 3-5-2 in its last ten games and currently find themselves one point out of a wild card spot. A somewhat revitilized Huberdeau leads the Flames in goals (10) and overall scoring with 21 points. Dan Vlader was the one who got torched by the Bolts, so expect rookie Dustin Wolf to be between the pipes tonight.
The Panthers have not won in Calgary since February 17, 2018, when they beat the Flames by a 6-3 count.
- WHEN: 10 p.m. ET
- WHERE: Scotiabank Saddledome – Calgary, AB
- ON THE TUBE: Scripps
- ON THE DIAL: 560 WQAM (D/B), 1230 The Gambler (PB), Thunder 100.3 (Keys)
- SOCIALS: #TimeToHunt, #Flames, #FLAvsCGY, @LitterBoxCats, LBC FaceBook
- ENEMY INTEL: Flame Nation
- FLA IN SEASON SERIES: Game 1 of 2
- LAST MEETING: @FLA 5, CGY 1 (Recap) – 3/9/2024
- NEXT MEETING: March 1, 2025
- PROJECTED STARTERS: Florida: Knight (5-4-1 .890 / 2.84 1SO) Calgary: Wolf (8-5-1 .909 / 2.84 1SO)
- PLAYER STATS: Florida / Calgary
Saturday in the Atlantic (Standings/Panthers Playoff Chances)
- Pittsburgh (13-14-4 30P) at OTTAWA (14-13-2 30P) 7 p.m.
- TORONTO (18-9-2 38P) at DETROIT (11-14-4 26P) 7 p.m. (NHL Network)
- BUFFALO (11-14-4 26P) at Washington (20-6-2 42P) 7 p.m.
- MONTREAL (11-15-3 25P) at Winnipeg (21-9-1 43P) 7 p.m.
- BOSTON (15-13-3 33P) at Vancouver (15-8-5 35P) 10 p.m.
- TAMPA BAY (15-10-2 32P) at Seattle (15-14-2 32P) 10 p.m.