Game 47: Winnipeg Jets vs Calgary Flames pre-game report

Yesterday the Jets held an optional skate which was lightly attended by seven skaters one of whom was Ville Heinola. There was some thought that this signaled he would be out tonight when Winnipeg welcomed Calgary to town. Both Haydn Fleury and Colin Miller seem ready to go so it’s entirely possible we see a swap out of the third pair for these two.Of course we also don’t know which goalie will be in net as we didn’t hear from head coach Scott Arniel following the skate. Might seem like a night to give Eric Comrie a start but nothing was established in that regard on Friday. Regardless of the roster moves the Jets are feeling good having won three straight and with the Wild, Stars and Avs all having lost their last game so they have some breathing room.

One team that doesn’t have the luxury of taking a breath is tonight’s opponent as the Flames are holding down the final wild card spot with a one point edge over the Canucks. Calgary has gone 5-5-0 in their last ten games and are much better at home (14-6-3) then they are on the road (7-10-4). They have the 20th ranked power play and the 30th ranked penalty kill.

Skate news:

According to Ken Wiebe of the Winnipeg Free Press the first goalie off is Eric Comrie.

Warm-up news:

While Jets head coach Scott Arniel wasn’t prepared to tip his hand we did finally get the info as to which defenceman would be playing as Colin Miller was listed on the game sheet.

Jets projected lines & D pairs:

Connor – Scheifele – Vilardi
Ehlers – Lowry – Iafallo
Niederreiter – Kupari – Perfetti
Toninato – Gustafsson – Barron

Morrissey – DeMelo
Samberg – Pionk
Stanley – Miller

Comrie
Hellebuyck

Flames projected lines & D pairs:

Huberdeau – Kadri – Pospisil
Coleman – Backlund – Coronato
Kerins – Sharangovich – Kuzmenko
Lomberg – Rooney – Pelletier

Bahl – Andersson
Weegar – Miromanov
Bean – Pachal

Wolf
Vladar

Up Next:

Puck drop is at 6 PM CST. Be sure to head over to illegalcurve.com following the game for a recap of the action. You can join us on our YouTube channel for the Illegal Curve Post-Game Show around 8:40 PM CST as we discuss and analyze the results of the game.