The Calgary Flames and the Tampa Bay Lightning meet in NHL action from the Amalie Arena on Thursday night.
The Calgary Flames will look to bounce back from a 6-2 loss at the hands of the Florida Panthers in their last game. Johnny Gaudreau leads the Flames in scoring with 37 points including a team-high 23 assists while Elias Lindholm has 28 points with 16 assists and 12 goals with Lindholm posting a team-high +26 plus/minus rating while Gaudreau has a +22 rating. Matthew Tkachuk has 14 goals and 15 assists for his 29 points while Andrew Mangiapane has 21 points and a team-high 18 goals. Jacob Markstrom’s gone 12-7-5 with a 2.15 GAA and a .926 save percentage up to this point in the season in goal for Calgary.
The Tampa Bay Lightning will look to build on their 7-2 win over the Columbus Blue Jackets in their last game. Steven Stamkos leads the Lightning in scoring with 40 points including a team-high 16 goals along with 24 assists while Victor Hedman also has 35 points with a team-high 28 assists as well this season. Alex Killorn has 30 points with 10 goals and 20 assists while the aforementioned Hedman has a team-high +10 plus/minus rating as well for the Bolts this season. Andrei Vaslievskiy has seen the bulk of the workload between the pipes for Tampa Bay this season, posting a record of 18-5-3 with a 2.21 GAA and a .924 save percentage on the year.
Calgary is 0-5 in their last 5 games against a team with a winning record and 0-5 in their last 5 games played on 1 day’s rest while the over is 4-0 in their last 4 games overall. Tampa Bay is 7-2 in their last 9 games following a win and 41-16 in their last 57 games as a home favorite while the over is 5-1 in their last 6 games overall.
The plus money with the Flames is worth a look considering that the Flames have played some solid hockey on the road this season. However, the Lightning are back to looking like the two-time defending Cup champions, and I think that Calgary’s in for a bit of a tough matchup here. Give me the Bolts and the reasonable price.