Toronto Maple Leafs @ Calgary Flames
09:00 PM at Scotiabank Saddledome
Watch on: TSN4, SNW

The Leafs last game was away on February 1 against the Edmonton Oilers, which Toronto won by a score of 4-3 in regulation. The Leafs have a record of 31-19-2 for a 0.615 Points %.

The Calgary Flames last played away on February 2 against the Seattle Kraken. The Flames won by a score of 3-2 in regulation, and their current league record is 26-19-7 for a 0.567 Points %.

Them

At the moment the Flames are fourth in the Pacific, and in a wild card playoff spot, but there isn't so much a race for those wild card spots in the west as a gang of teams that don't seem to want them very much. The Flames can't count on keeping that spot and their -11 goal differential doesn't exactly scream out lock for the post-season.

This is the Leafs' first game vs Calgary this season, with the return engagement coming in mid-March, so this team is fairly mysterious, but a closer look shows some similarities to the Leafs.

Both teams are middling in Corsi at five-on-five but, while the Leafs only slightly shave off value with some poor offensive shooting locations, the Flames just cut the heart out of their very good offensive pace and turn themselves into a team that is sixth from the bottom in terms of goals scored.

Watch out for those point shots.

That said, the overall difference between Calgary and Toronto is pretty subtle. There aren't big gaps between teams in the middle ranks at five-on-five.

Their power play is not very good, and they don't score on it much. In all-situations their Shooting % is near the bottom of the league, and their main event is goaltending approximately equal to Toronto's.

Flames had an optional skate today and Tyson Barrie is drawing back in, actual defence pairs to be revealed at game time.

Lines

Pat Steinberg's projection for tonight:

Jonathan Huberdeau - Nazem Kadri - Joel Farabee
Blake Coleman - Mikael Backlund - Matt Coronato
Yegor Sharangovich - Morgan Frost - Martin Pospisil
Ryan Lomberg - Kevin Rooney - Adam Klapka

Joel Hanley - Rasmus Andersson
MacKenzie Weegar - Jake Bean
Tyson Barrie - Brayden Pachal

Dustin Wolf - confirmed starter
Dan Vladar

Us

Anthony Stolarz is back, Mitch Marner might be out, and Morgan Rielly was back on the power play.

Joe Woll was not at morning skate, but he is set to be the starter with Stolarz potentially ready for the Thursday game in Seattle. Both Mitch Marner and Oliver Ekman-Larsson are game-time decisions. The lines below assume they are both out.

Lines

Yesterday's practice lines:

Matthew Knies - Auston Matthews - Max Domi
Max Pacioretty - John Tavares - William Nylander
Bobby McMann - Pontus Holmberg - Nicholas Robertson
Steven Lorentz - David Kämpf - Ryan Reaves

Jake McCabe - Chris Tanev
Morgan Rielly - Phil Myers
Simon Benoit - Conor Timmins

Joe Woll - starter
Matt Murray

The Game

Moneypuck has this game at 51.4% favouring Toronto*, so given that home ice advantage is about two percentage points on these probabilities, they have Toronto about 3 points or so better than the Flames.

*before official confirmation on Toronto's lineup

It's a slug fest in the muddy middle with two good goalies.

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