Don't look now, but the Calgary Flames just might be hitting their stride.
"We've got a resilient team," forward Blake Coleman said after the Flames' 3-1 victory over the Vegas Golden Knights on Saturday. "A lot of guys stepping up, playing really good hockey. Really, we got everybody going right now, which is good. ... The confidence is growing higher and higher every day."
The Flames' gutsy win in Sin City marked their third straight victory, and they're a respectable 5-2-0 since the calendar flipped to 2024.
This recent run is a breath of fresh air for a team that has struggled to find consistent results since the beginning of the 2022-23 campaign.
"We're feeling it," veteran Nazem Kadri said, according to Sportsnet's Eric Francis. "We've been really focusing in the second half of the year, stepping it up, and we feel like we can beat just about anybody if we are on our game. We're showing that of late, and we've beat a lot of good teams."
The Flames are currently two points behind the streaking Oilers for the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference, though Edmonton has four games in hand. The Nashville Predators are four points ahead in the first spot and have played the same number of games as Calgary.
Calgary netminder Jacob Markstrom is aware there's plenty of work to do as his team hopes to make the playoffs after missing out last year.
"We can't go .500 anymore," he said. "We got to try to make up ground and catch teams, we've got to string a few together. This was a good trip, we got to go home and charge the batteries tomorrow and get back to work."
Markstrom has started each game of the Flames' winning streak, posting a .939 save percentage and 2.00 goals-against average over that stretch. He also leads the league with 25.05 goals saved above expected at all strengths on the campaign, per Evolving Hockey.
Coleman suggested Calgary will go as its goaltender goes.
"(Markstrom's) got that courage and that character that has been radiating through our team in front of him, and that's where it all starts," he said.
Coleman has been no slouch himself, leading the Flames with 19 goals and 37 points in 43 games, including 13 tallies and 24 points in his last 18 contests. Kadri, meanwhile, is riding a six-game point streak.
Calgary is about to embark on a six-game homestand, starting with a clash against the Arizona Coyotes on Tuesday.
Copyright © 2024 Score Media Ventures Inc. All rights reserved. Certain content reproduced under license.