Pre-game trash-talk from Calgary

I would be surprised if this dowbboy piece (Calgary Herald) doesn’t make it to Roberto Luongo’s dressing room stall by tonight.

Brother can you spare a goal? The causes for the Calgary Flames’ recent scoring woes are plentiful. Foremost among the reasons for the drought has been the succession of hot goalies who’ve tortured the Flames with their acrobatics. From Steve Mason to Nicklas Backstrom to Marc-Andre Fleury, a parade of excellent goalies has stonewalled Calgary’s shooters for much of the past month. Call it bad luck, call it fate, but the Flames have found themselves stymied by netminders who are at the top of their game.

That will likely not be the case tonight in Vancouver. While the Canucks mounted a brilliant run to make up a 13-point deficit and catch Calgary for the Northwest lead, their star goalie and captain Roberto Luongo has struggled since returning from a serious leg injury. Even as his teammates ratcheted up the pressure on the Flames, Luongo was giving up at least one soft goal a game.

O rly?

Well, dowbboy, let me catch you up.

On January 31st, the Canucks were 22-20-8 (52 pts., 12th in Western Conference) and the Flames were 30-14-4 (64 pts, 3rd in Western Conference). Here’s a comparison of what the Luongo and Kipru-soft have done since then:

[Table=27]

Overall, our goalie’s actually played pretty damn good while Calgary’s has let in more through the five-hole than Tera Patrick on a slow work day. Combined with improved play from the rest of the Canucks, it’s little wonder the Canucks have caught up to the Flames.

Now, I’m sure this piece was written intentionally to incite Canucks fans so so be it. IMHO, it probably would’ve been more effective if dowbboy had actually watched Luongo play the last couple of months.