30 Teams In 30 Days–Calgary Flames

The Calgary Flames found themselves getting hosed quite often last season. The goaltending situation was a mess and Calgary got hammered on a few nights too despite having the 11th best offense and top-15 special team units on both the power play and penalty kill.

Team Name: Calgary Flames

Record: 19-25-4, 4th Northwest, No playoffs

Player of the Season: Mike Cammalleri led the team with 13-19–32 and 15 of those points came on the power play. He was one of the few moderately reliable players on this team. Of course, the -15 rating will turn some people off but this was a team that gave up a lot of goals at even strength.

Breakout of the Season: This was a tough call since the team was all-around lousy but it goes to defenseman Dennis Wideman. He played for his fifth different team in as many seasons and looked to be halfway decent for the Flames. Wideman’s line of 6-16–22 with 13 power-play points looks good. It won’t cover the blemish of a -9 rating but he’s still one to watch next season, assuming he stays with the Flames.

Disappointment of the Season: Miikka Kiprusoff was beyond bad in goal for the Flames as were all of the goalies on this team. The team used four different goaltenders during the season and three of them had a goals against average of at least 3.00. Calgary kept running goalies into the ground. The Kipper started several games in a row before injuring his knee. Then the backup had about eight starts in a row before he yielded to the next in line. The Flames needed to use a platoon system instead of a riding a bunch of so-so goalies.

Team Analysis: The team was 28th in goals against and allowed 3.3 goals per game for the season. That just won’t get it done. They had four players with 10 or more goals and five players with at least 25 points but the defensive issues overshadowed them.

They traded away Jarome Iginla to Boston, sent Jay Bouwmeester to St. Louis and Kiprusoff may have played his last game in Calgary so this team will have to have someone step forward and try to become the face of this franchise. Perhaps Calgary will use its first-round pick on a blueliner to shore up the leaky defense.

2013-2014 Story Lines: Who’s going to be the goaltender? It’s going to be tough to replace a guy with 319 wins but someone will have to do it. Calgary had a habit of riding goaltenders until they broke down this past season so it’s really anyone’s guess as to who will take the crease. Can they rebound from their first losing season in the last five years? Each of the last four seasons they finished with at least 90 points. It’s certainly going to take that many to be in playoff consideration in the West like it does nearly every season.

2013-2014 Fantasy Guys to Have: Cammalleri, Curtis Glencross, Lee Stempniak, Wideman

Guys On the Fringe: Jiri Hudler, Alex Tanguay, Mark Giordano, The starting goaltender.