Preseason Preview: Calgary Flames vs Edmonton Oilers 9/17/18 (2/10)

The Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers will meet for their first of two pre-season tilts tonight at the Scotiabank Saddledome in Calgary. The teams abolished their traditional split-squad matchup this year with the Flames already having their main team over in Chinar for the China games.

This will be the Flames second game of the pre-season and first in North America, having lost to the Boston Bruins 4-3 in a shootout in Shenzhen. For Edmonton, this will be their first contest of the 2018-19 season.

Both teams will be dressing a lineup mainly consisting of youngsters and AHL players tonight. The lineups will look very similar to the ones we saw in the rookie games, with the insertion of some veterans and PTO’s on both sides.

David Rittich will be getting the start for the Flames while Mikko Koskinen will get the start for Edmonton. Koskinen is a 30 year old Finnish goaltender who most recently put up a ridiculous 22-4-1 record and a 0.937 Sv% with St.Petersburg of the KHL. Edmonton is hoping those numbers translate to North America.

After a sparkling pair of rookie games, Dillon Dube will get his chance to impress in front of a more experienced lineup. For the time being, he’ll be centering a line with newly acquired Flames Kerby Rychel and Buddy Robinson.

Other notable Flames prospects in tonight’s game include Andrew Mangiapane, Spencer Foo, Matthew Phillips, Juuso Valimaki, Oliver Kylington, and Tyler Parsons backing up Rittich.

Here are your projected lines for tonight’s game:

Calgary

Forwards

Andrew Mangiapane – Alan Quine – Spencer Foo

Kerby Rychel – Dillon Dube – Buddy Robinson

Brett Pollock – Tyler Graovac – Matthew Phillips

Ryan Lomberg – Logan Shaw – Scott Sabourin

Defence

Oliver Kylington – Duncan Siemens

Juuso Valimaki – Justin Falk

Viktor Svedberg – Ryan Sproul

Goalies

David Rittich

Tyler Parsons

Edmonton

Forwards

Tyler Benson – Ryan McLeod – Kailer Yamamoto

Patrick Russell – Brad Malone – Alex Chiasson (hello old friend)

Joseph Gambardella – Josh Currie – Pontius Aberg

Evan Polei – Tyler Vesel – Cameron Hebig

Defence

Kevin Gravel – Ethan Bear

Ryan Stanton – Evan Bouchard

William Lagesson – Logan Day

Goalies

Mikko Koskinen

Shane Starrett

Puck drop is at 7:00 MT tonight, and the game will be streamed by the Calgary Flames Facebook, Youtube, and Website. The game will also be available on Sportsnet 960 as always.

by Michael MacGillivray