The Flames are Dallas tonight (630PM MT, PPV), and as my old friend Sacamano would say, it's nut-cuttin' time. With the Canucks hosting St. Louis, and the Wild in Edmonton, it's quite likely that the Flames will need a win just to maintain the NW standings as they are now.

...which won't be easy. Recent road woes aside, the Flames' last win in Dallas featured Bob Boughner and Igor Kravchuk patrolling the blueline (game-winning goal: Rob Niedermayer. Hmm, that was his 3rd goal of the season, in Game 33 -- no wonder I hated that guy).

It was definitely a mixed effort last night. I thought it was a pretty good performance in the first two periods (let's agree to forget about the first 3 minutes). Yelle and Hamrlik -- and Iginla -- looked strong. Tanguay made a few too many "one-too-many" passes, but redeemed himself somewhat when one of them resulted in the Yelle goal. Lombardi was getting himself in good positions to produce, though granted he had an awful time once he got there.

And, the team defence, to my eyes, looked pretty good. Colorado would pressure and control the puck at times, but Calgary always seemed to break it up right before it turned into an actual scoring chance.

The third period, though, did look like the Evil Twin. Dubious goal by Kipper; pucks bouncing over sticks; inability to string 3 passes together; random Avs wandering around untouched in the Flames' zone; etc. Very aggravating, the cherry on top being the game-ending PP where they didn't threaten in the slightest.

But tomorrow is another day, blah blah... the Stars still have some injury problems, and are certainly beatable with a strong & sustained performance. And it's not as if the Flames don't know north from south on the road: 12 road losses since Christmas, and 10 of them have been by one goal (or one goal + EN goal). I decline to believe that this is an effort issue, or a character issue.

Calgary 4 (Tanguay, Phaneuf, Iginla, Langkow)
Dallas 1 (that guy from Finland)

Go Flames.