Nothing much to talk about except my anxiety heading into this contest. Calgary hasn't played good hockey since the all-star break and it's begun to catch up with them recently. On the other hand, the Hawks keep proving that they shouldn't be taken lightly anymore and have beat up on a couple of their last few opponents.
So after the Washington and Atlanta debacles, I can't say Im confident of a Flames victory today. The defense has looked slower and dumber than ever the last few weeks and Calgary's break-out transition game looks to be in shambles as a result. As I mentioned in the Thrashers pre-game (I think), Calgary is exposed by a fast, aggressive forecheck: if Savard chooses to send two deep all afternoon, the Flames are bound to play a large portion of the game in their end and it'll take a big effort by Kipper or Iginla to pull this one out...
Prediction - pain.
EDIT - Apparently Hale's out (for good reason) and Eriksson's in (ugh). Here's the baffling part: Keenan is playing Anders with Dion and bumping Vandermeer down to play with Aucoin (???)! Can anyone explain to me this ridiculous notion that Eriksson has to play with Phaneuf if and when he's in the line-up? Bubba has demonstrably sutrggled in the 4th d position all goddamned year...and while Vandermeer had started to look more like the depth defensemen that he is recently, he sure as hell STILL looked better than Eriksson.
Fu**!
