The Calgary Flames finally found a power supply, and Devin Cooley made sure nobody switched it off.
Calgary scored twice with the man-advantage, then survived a frantic third period to beat the Minnesota Wild 2-1 Thursday night, extending its winning streak to two games at the Saddledome in Calgary.
Aydar Suniev and Joel Farabee scored first-period power-play goals, while Cooley stopped 36 of 37 shots for his second straight victory. The Flames improved to 3-6-0 after opening their four-game homestand with wins over Carolina and Minnesota and winning three of their past four games after a difficult opening stretch.
“Beating Carolina last game definitely gave us a lot of confidence,” Farabee said to reporters. “We just rolled into this game with that same confidence and had a good start and let that propel us throughout the game.”
For two periods, anyway.
Suniev opened the scoring at 10:49, taking Adam Klapka’s feed in the slot before snapping a shot over Jesper Wallstedt’s glove. It was Suniev’s third goal in six games this season. The shot left his stick quickly enough to make the replay feel almost unnecessary afterward for everyone watching closely.
Farabee doubled Calgary’s lead at 14:06 after Wallstedt stopped Morgan Frost’s initial attempt. Farabee collected the rebound and fired it past Jared Spurgeon, who tried to help in the crease. The goal was Farabee’s first of the season and Calgary’s second conversion on four power-play opportunities Thursday night at home.
Huska believes one goal could change everything for Farabee, who had generated chances through eight scoreless games.
“As long as the chances are coming for him, he’s a bit of a streaky scorer,” Huska said to reporters, “so we’re anticipating this will hopefully open some floodgates for him in the weeks ahead.”
Calgary protected that 2-0 lead until Michael McCarron scored for Minnesota at 4:39 of the third. From there, the Wild poured forward, firing 17 shots in the period while Calgary managed three. Cooley had spent two periods waiting for heavy work. Suddenly, it arrived in waves from everywhere at once.
“The last five or 10 minutes where I was like, ‘Okay, now it’s my turn. Like to return the favor a little bit,’” Cooley said to reporters. “The guys battled so hard for me. I wanted to battle for them.”
Minnesota kept coming. Cooley kept answering every time they attacked late again.
His loudest answer came after Jared Spurgeon found Kirill Kaprizov near the net. Kaprizov slid the puck across to Matt Boldy with Cooley stranded at the opposite post. Cooley lunged across his crease, got his left pad and glove onto the shot and stole Minnesota’s best late chance outright cold.
Cooley described himself as being “in a pretty solid flow state” and said he “kept it pretty chill.” That calm looked almost unreasonable considering Minnesota controlled the third period, but it worked.
“I’m really glad I was able to make some saves,” Cooley said to reporters, because his teammates “were just unbelievable.”
“Everyone was blocking shots,” Cooley said. “The power play was great. The penalty kill was great. It was just incredible.” Calgary blocked 12 shots, killed all four Minnesota power plays and withstood the closing push after Wallstedt went to the bench for an extra attacker late in regulation Thursday night.
Huska preferred the opening 40 minutes to the final 20.
“For two periods, I thought we were really good,” he said. “I thought we did a lot of good things against a good team.”
Then came honesty: “In the third period, our goaltender was our best player.”
That said enough.
Ryan Strome said the Flames’ recovery from a 1-6-0 start has been powered by “a great buy-in” throughout the dressing room. “Everyone’s committed to doing things the right way,” Strome said in another interview posted by the club.
The last two victories have looked different but required that commitment equally.
Against Carolina, Calgary won with timely offence.
Against Minnesota, the Flames won by squeezing two goals from special teams, then handing the crease to Cooley. Wallstedt stopped 20 shots at the other end, while Minnesota finished with a 38-22 advantage in shots and 56.6 per cent of faceoffs won overall.
Nothing about the third period was comfortable, but comfort has not exactly followed Calgary through October. The Flames instead found goals from Suniev and Farabee, saves from Cooley and the sort of stubborn finish that turns a shaky start into something much more interesting.
Now they have momentum too, finally.
