Once again, the task was a tall one for Dan Vladar.
But this time the Flames’ six-foot-five backup rose to the occasion with an outing that was as big for him as it was for the team.
Winless in his last six starts, dating back to Dec. 10, his 29-save performance in Seattle Sunday was the difference in a crucial 3-2 win.
“Means a lot, obviously,” he told Ryan Leslie on the Sportsnet broadcast.
“Wolfie (Calder front-runner Dustin Wolf) has been playing unbelievable, but I haven’t won a game since, what, two months?”
The prospects weren’t necessarily great that he’d change his fortunes Sunday, as the Flames played less than 24 hours earlier and arrived at their Seattle hotel at close to 3 a.m. due to customs issues.
However, a series of lucky breaks for the Flames in the first period gave the club a 3-0 lead he played a big role in protecting, right up until the final 10 seconds when he punctuated his evening with a game-saving pad save.
“When you are up 3-0 after the first you kind of know it’s coming, but the guys in front did a great job blocking shots and clearing things out,” said Vladar, who has been tasked with playing the second half of all seven back-to-backs the Flames have had this year, going 2-5.
“Backs (captain Mikael Backlund) mentioned it – either we make it an excuse or we go and battle … and we battled.”
More takeaways from a win that saw the Flames stretch their lead over Vancouver for the final wild-card spot to two points:
If the Flames felt like they could’ve used a break or two in recent losses to Washington and Detroit, well, they got them in spades early Sunday night.
In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to see a team get as many in succession as they did to grab a 3-0 lead 20 minutes in.
It started when Flames video coach Jamie Pringle had Seattle’s game-opening goal on Dan Vladar disallowed on a coach’s challenge. The replay officials agreed Jaden Schwartz’s skate clipped Vladar’s stick, infringing on his ability to reset in time to make the stick save.
Those calls can generally go either way.
Shortly thereafter, newbie Morgan Frost opened the scoring with his first as a Flame, starting a barrage of good fortune.
First, Yegor Sharangovich scored a flukey goal that saw him lose the handle on a deke, only to see the puck trickle through Joey Daccord’s legs.
Compounding their good fortune on the play was a slashing penalty called on Seattle tacked on after the goal.
After calling a timeout to review the goal, Seattle challenged it. Despite the fact that Sharangovich’s stick indeed changed the angle of Daccord’s paddle and prevented him from making the stop, the goal was upheld.
That meant Seattle was subsequently down two men, opening the door for Jonathan Huberdeau to score while on a five-on-three.
Oh sure, the Flames got jobbed by a phantom icing call that led to Seattle’s second goal. But Flames fans may want to refrain from suggesting they don’t get any breaks for a while.
Huberdeau hits milestone
For the seventh time in his career, Huberdeau hit the 20-goal mark, with the power play goal he one-timed in from the side of the net.
What’s noteworthy about this one is he did it in fewer games than ever before, getting it just 52 games in.
Symbolic of just how much his game has grown this year, Huberdeau also ended the evening with a big shot block in the final 20 seconds, as the team scrambled to hold onto the win.
For the second night in a row, all eyes were on the two newbies from Philadelphia, who were playing in their third game in four nights, in three different time zones.
Frost opened the game’s scoring with his first as a Flame, and his 12th on the season, when he gained the offensive zone, made a nice move in traffic and rifled a shot from the high slot top shelf.
Minutes earlier he’d shown good hands down low when he corralled a rebound and would have scored had it not been for a skate save by Cale Fleury on the goal line.
All told, he had five shots, was 8 of 13 in the faceoff circle and played almost 18 minutes, which included five minutes on the top power-play unit.
Joel Farabee also found himself in the thick of things all night, bookending a painful shot block in the first and a high stick just under his eye in the third with three shots, which included a dangerous redirect.
Coleman-Backlund-Coronato
Sharangovich-Frost-Pospisil
The Flames host Toronto on Tuesday to kick off a three-game homestand that sends them into the 4 Nations Face-Off break.
