The Living Impaired

Well, it's now an out-and-out slump. The Flames did their best zombie impressions last night to fall to the Islanders 3-2 and extend the losing streak to 3 straight. So now after ripping up the NHL for nearly 2 full months, it looks like Calgary has decided to take a "mental vacation" from the game. What else can account for the total, team-wide lack of focus and the sudden inability to execute fundamental plays that seems to have stricken them recently? Examples? Jordan Leopold's 2 blatant and uncharactarisitc gaffe's that lead to a couple of break-aways and the game winning powerplay goal last night. How about Amonte missing an open night on a 5on3 PP? Or 6 Flames players alone in their end with the game winding down...staring at the puck, each waiting for the other to start the play. Shudder! Even Kipper looked skyward in frustration last night.

Gotta say, the only two players who looked like they WEREN'T significantly hung over were Kiprusoff and Phaneuf last night. Huselius was decent at times as was Lombardi. The Yelle line had some okay shifts. Aside from that, the team appeared timid, tired and mediocre, at best. Simon finally decided to fight Thursday night...problem is he lost both bouts. His stock is definately falling in my eyes. And then there's Ference. As Sutter pointed out in the paper today, he's a pathetic -8 on a team that is 12 games over .500. I've mentioned Leopold's game (worst he's had in a long time, I'd say), so no need to go over it again. Iginla did score, his 2nd in 4 games...but, let's face it - it was a tip in. No blazing top corner shot from the slot, and no battling through traffic to jam it in. In fact, he spent the majority of the contest shooting it wide and playing on the perimeter. Again.

...(SIGH)...

That said, every team goes through slumps. Just ask Edmonton, Vancouver or even Ottawa. I expect Calgary to rediscover what makes them successful - high pressure forechecking and tight defense - relatively quickly and get back in the winning column. However, until that happens, Im not sure how many more of these "Night of the Living Dead" games I can stomach...

(No Positives and Negatives today. It'd alllllllllllllllllll be negatives).