Elias stole the show once again.
For both teams.
Three nights after Elias Pettersson’s brilliant debut in Vancouver, fellow countryman Elias Lindholm returned the favour in his first home game as a Flame.
For the second game in a row Petterson was no slouch either.
The two Swedish forwards both had two goals and an assist in a wildly entertaining game that saw the host Calgary Flames score four unanswered goals in the third period to escape with a 7-4 win that included two empty-netters.
Playing on Calgary’s top line with Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan, Lindholm kicked off the Flames home opener with a goal 12 seconds in, and followed it up with the game-winner with five minutes left.
The decisive goal in a game led 4-3 by the Canucks after 40 minutes came on a beautiful cross-ice pass by Gaudreau that Lindholm snapped home, allowing the notoriously slow-starting Flames to breathe a massive sigh of relief.
[relatedlinks]
“I tried to shoot it as fast as possible and it wasn’t my best shot but it went in – it was a great pass,” said Lindholm.
“It’s real fun to play with those two. They think the game similar to me.”
It was the Flames’ third power-play goal of the evening, following a season-opening loss to Vancouver in which they were 0-for-7 with the extra man.
“We kept it a little more simple and we won more faceoffs tonight on the power play,” said Lindholm, a winger whose faceoff prowess allowed him to win 12 of 14 draws.
“We needed something like this.”
For a good chunk of the evening it appeared the hero would be Pettersson, the 19-year-old first-round pick of the Canucks from 2017 who won the scoring title and MVP honours in the Swedish League last year.
He followed up a first-period goal with a power-play marker early in the second that marked his third NHL goal in four shots – all on Mike Smith. However, it was his setup on Bo Horvat’s power-play goal late in the second that put the Canucks up 4-3 and had a nervous Calgary crowd wondering if it would be the winner.
Enter Gaudreau.
Gaudreau’s first of the season came midway through the game, one minute after a Matthew Tkachuk power-play goal was disallowed due to Derek Ryan’s stick impeding Jacob Markstrom’s ability to make the save.
In the third Gaudreau threaded two brilliant cross-ice passes which were converted into the tying and go-ahead goals – the first by Monahan, the second by Lindholm.
“Three things for me tonight,” said Bill Peters of his first win as Flames coach.
“Resilience after 40, down one. I also thought we were resilient on the power play after (Tkachuk’s) was waived off. And Smitty’s save when it was 4-4. That was huge.”
Smith atoned for another shaky outing late when he made an all-world glove save on Nikolay Goldobin from a few feet out with 10 minutes left that brought the crowd to its feet. All told he made 16 saves.
Pettersson’s elite stickhandling, skating, vision and shot were on display all night, in just his second NHL game, drawing praise from everyone including Lindholm.
“He’s skilled and he’s been looking good so far,” said the Flame, who was acquired in a summer trade with Carolina involving Noah Hanifin, Dougie Hamilton and Micheal Ferland.
“I followed (Pettersson) a little last year in the Elite League and it’s going to be fun to watch. I played an exhibition game with him in the summer so I know how skilled he is.”
The narrative heading into the game revolved around the score some felt the Flames might try settling with Erik Gudbranson, who broke Travis Hamonic’s jaw Wednesday in a fight precipitated by a questionable hit on Dillon Dube.
Many figured Dalton Prout was inserted into the Flames lineup for the injured Hamonic with an eye on payback, but the third-pairing blue-liners were only on the ice a few times at the same time. There was no interaction.
Ironically, Prout was penalized for an ill-timed hit (just like Gudbranson three nights earlier) early in the second period to set up Pettersson’s second of the night, a nifty one-timer from the dot.
The Flames power play had trouble even entering the zone in Vancouver, setting up two days of intense power-play work that paid off Saturday.
“We knew our power play wasn’t great in Vancouver and part of the reasons we lost so we knew we had to step it up,” said Gaudreau, the game’s first star with three points.
“We were moving the puck around pretty well tonight. A lot of practice the past two days and a lot of video on the power play. I think we definitely got better there. It was a big win for us.”
The Flames’ late push helped them avoid leaving for a three-game trip through Nashville, St. Louis and Colorado with an 0-2 record against a rebuilding team predicted by many to dwell near the bottom of the West.
