Sutter Wins in LA Return, Flames Start Road Trip Strong

Scoring

1st

LAK [1]- Iafallo (9) (Edler (9), Arvidsson (6)) 4:30

CGY [1] PPG- Mangiapane (16) (Backlund (5), Hanifin (8)) 11:19

CGY [2] PPG- Lucic (7) (Mangiapane (3), Kylington (11)) 16:28

2nd

CGY [3]- Tkachuk (11) (Gaudreau (17), Gudbranson (5) 4:54

LAK [2]- Edler (1) (Arvidsson (7) (Danault (8)) 18:11

3rd

None

Game Notes:

Welcome back: Two long time Kings were finally welcomed back to the Staples Center. Trevor Lewis, who played with the Jets last season but obviously never left Canada, won two cups with the Kings, and with whom he had spent his entire 10 year career with prior to that. Darryl Sutter was also back behind an NHL bench for the first time since splitting from LA in 2017, and who had guided the Kings to both of those cups. Both were honoured with a video presentation.

Unfamiliar territory: As Alex Iafallo’s deflection settled on the ice inside the Calgary net, the Flames were left with an unfamiliar feeling: they’d allowed the first goal of the game. Despite this anomaly, Calgary bounced back strong in the first to take a lead into intermission.

Second unit? Says who?: It wasn’t a bad night for the first powerplay unit, but it just so happened that the second squad had all the magic tonight. Andrew Mangiapane continued his road brilliance off a nice Mikael Backlund setup, but Mang scoring road goals is to be expected at this point right? What hasn’t been expected of Mang this season however, has been…

An assist?: With a soft little touch through the slot, Mang found Lucic cutting through the open ice, and the big man potted it. Despite a whopping 16 goals this season, that was only Mangiapane’s third apple. If you haven’t seen Lucic’s goal yet, I will give you exactly one guess as to the placement of his shot before you watch the highlight below.

Tkachuked: It has been the gift that keeps on giving, and the Matthew Tkachuk/Drew Doughty rivalry was certainly renewed in their first meeting in two seasons. Some less-than-friendly exchanges saw Tkachuk end up in the penalty box by himself late in the first period, but he would end the night with the last laugh. Doughty provided the perfect screen for Tkachuk as he lasered the eventual game winner over the stunned trapper of Cal Petersen.

Long-time coming: It had been 80 games since Alex Edler last scored, and the long-time former Canuck couldn’t have picked a worse time to go cold. He sat on 99 career goals for that entire stretch before finally breaking that milestone tonight, with a rip over former teammate Jakob Markstrom. The Flames netminder finished with a superb 40 saves on the night, as he once again gave up 2 or fewer goals.

by Gordie Taylor