Canucks at Flames
The Calgary Flames look to use home ice to their advantage and regain the upper hand in their Western Conference first-round series when they host the Vancouver Canucks in Game 3 on Sunday. After staging a familiar third-period rally to pull out a 2-1 victory in the opener, Calgary was unable to take control of the series Friday, allowing two goals in the first 7:06 of Game 2 en route to a 4-1 loss.
Defenseman Kris Russell, who scored the winner in Game 1, netted a power-play goal for the Flames late in the third period of a contest that turned ugly several minutes later. A total of 132 penalty minutes were handed out with 1:17 remaining as a line brawl featuring Calgary defenseman Deryk Engelland and Vancouver forward Derek Dorsett broke out, with Engelland collecting three game misconducts - although one was rescinded by the NHL on Saturday. The melee overshadowed a strong performance by Vancouver, which received goals from Daniel Sedin and Chris Higgins in the opening period before Ronalds Kenins and Radim Vrbata tallied in the third. The Canucks did their best to make Eddie Lack's workload lighter en route to his first career postseason victory, limiting the Flames to 23 shots overall and just three in the first session.
TV: 10 p.m. ET, NBCSN, CBC, TVA
ABOUT THE CANUCKS: Friday's victory removed a huge monkey off the back of Vancouver, which had lost seven consecutive home playoff contests since defeating Boston in Game 5 of the 2011 Stanley Cup final. Sedin shook what must have felt like a gorilla off his back, tallying 2:56 into the contest to snap his 12-game playoff drought. But no one could have felt more relieved than Higgins, who rid himself of an entire band of the hairy mammals by scoring his first goal in 21 postseason games.
ABOUT THE FLAMES: Bob Hartley's wallet got lighter Saturday as the coach was fined $50,000 by the league for his responsibility for the incident in Game 2. Sam Bennett expects to play Sunday after missing a portion of Friday's contest following a collision with Vancouver defenseman Alex Edler. "It was just a bump, maybe knocked the wind out of me a bit," the 18-year-old rookie said Saturday. "I'm fine now, 100 percent fine. That won't be a problem."
OVERTIME
1. Flames LW Johnny Gaudreau, who tied for the rookie scoring lead in the regular season with 64 points, notched his first career playoff point with an assist on Russell's goal on Friday.
2. Sunday's contest will be Calgary's first home playoff game since 2009, when it lost its first-round series against Chicago in six.
3. Russell scored just one goal in 13 career postseason games prior to this series.