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

Hiller: Ducks sent Flames a ‘wake-up call’

Jonas Hiller, Jiri Hudler, of the Czech Republic,

Jonas Hiller, Jiri Hudler, of the Czech Republic,

AP

It’s tough to move on from a beating as one-sided as the Calgary Flames suffered in a 6-1 loss to the Anaheim Ducks in Game 1. It seems like the Flames are wisely going the “burn the game tape” route.

“They wanted it more than us tonight and that’s a wake-up call for us,” Jonas Hiller said.

The Flames’ struggles in Anaheim are well-documented, and little happened on Thursday to curb such talk ... at least for those who tend to cite contextual stats.

“Tonight, they gave us a real good idea of the price we will have to pay if we want to leave this building with a win,” Bob Hartley said.

One concern might be: as much of a wake-up call as this might be, it may not matter if the Flames lost two-thirds of their crucial top line to injuries.

The news was mostly promising after the game in that regard, though.

Hartley noted that Jiri Hudler and Michael Ferland are day-to-day, which can mean anything in the playoffs ... but at least there wasn’t talk about series or playoff-ending injuries.

The biggest lingering question revolved around Johnny Gaudreau sitting out the third period, but Hartley said he was merely resting the pint-sized star. He also noted that the Ducks were taking too many “liberties” with the standout rookie. (He received a painful looking cross-check in the second period, for example.)

Long story short, the Flames were about as positive as you can expect a team to be after getting thoroughly dominated and suffering some potentially problematic injuries. They also get an extra day to lick their wounds, as Game 2 won’t happen until Sunday.