Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Tough day: Flames ‘throw it to the dumpster’ against Avalanche

Flames

After they squared off over Ryan O’Reilly, the Calgary Flames and Colorado Avalanche faced each other on the ice just hours later.

Earlier in the day, the Flames signed O’Reilly to an offer sheet only to have the Avalanche match it.

The Flames, perhaps motivated by the events earlier in the day, jumped out to a three-goal lead after the first period. That was reduced to a two-goal lead after 40 minutes.

By the time the game ended, the Avalanche had completed the comeback and were victorious by a score of 5-4.

“Big win for us,” Avalanche center Matt Duchene told The Denver Post. “Probably one of the best Avalanche wins I’ve ever been apart of.”

This is how Flames captain Jarome Iginla, who scored two goals, summed it up from his team’s perspective. Blowing the lead and then losing in the third period came with an unpleasant odour.

“On every goal there were major breakdowns, whether it was bad decisions or lack of effort,” Flames head coach Bob Hartley told NHL.com.

“We played a great first period and found a way to throw it to the dumpster. I’ve watched many games from last year and it seems to be the same song. We just stopped playing.”