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It’s Calgary Flames day on PHT

markgiordanogetty

Throughout the month of August, PHT will be dedicating a day to all 30 NHL clubs. Today’s team? The Calgary Flames.

One way or another, 2013 was set up to be a crossroads season for the Calgary Flames. They had already missed out on the playoffs in their three previous seasons, but had spent years resisting calls to embrace a rebuilding process by trading captain Jarome Iginla or star goaltender Miikka Kiprusoff before they moved out of their prime.

By the time the 2013 season started, the cornerstones of their franchise were in the mid-30s and with Iginla’s contract set to expire, the Flames needed to prove that they could take a significant step forward with their current roster. They didn’t. Instead, with the possibility of losing Iginla as an unrestricted free agent hanging over their heads, the Flames moved Iginla and Jay Bouwmeester in the days leading up to the trade deadline.

They might have dealt Kiprusoff too, but he struggled mightily during the 2013 campaign and despite some reported interest from the Toronto Maple Leafs, he ended up staying with the Calgary.

On April 23, with his team’s playoff chances long since vanished, Kiprusoff allowed four goals on 32 shots in a meaningless game against the Nashville Predators. That might be the way it all ends for him. With a season still left on his contract, the man whose career took off in 2003-04 when he led the Calgary Flames within one win of the Stanley Cup is heavily leaning towards retirement.

Offseason recap

With the team now focused on rebuilding, Calgary resisted the urge to make a big splash during the free agent frenzy. Instead, Calgary re-signed forwards Mikael Backlund and Brian McGrattan as well as defenseman T.J. Brodie.

They also had Pittsburgh and St. Louis’ first-round picks in the 2013 NHL Entry Draft thanks to the Iginla and Bouwmeester trades respectively. With those picks, along with their own, they drafted Canadian forwards Sean Monahan, Emile Poirier, and Morgan Klimchuk.

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