Canadiens Talk It Out, Rally to Defeat Flames, Tie Series

The brave words in the Calgary Flames’ dressing room sounded hollow, like the whistling in the dark of a lone youngster walking past a graveyard.

No, the Flames said Wednesday night after the Montreal Canadiens had come back to beat them, 4-2, before a capacity crowd of 20,062 at the Saddledome to even the Stanley Cup series at one game each, they were not giving a thought to what had happened in 1986.

Of course, the Flames want keep the two series separate in their minds. In ‘86, the only other time the Flames have been in the Stanley Cup finals, they won the first game at home. They lost the second game at home. And then they lost the next three.

End of story.

So the Flames aren’t spooked by the same scenario? They aren’t afraid the ghosts of games past will come back to haunt them, that this series might have the same, scary ending?

“I’m not even thinking about 1986,” Flame wing Joey Mullen said as he fielded a string of questions about that year. “That’s history.”

Flame Coach Terry Crisp acknowledged that the team was haunted by its near-misses in the second period. “When we were hitting the post and missing the net by inches, I was standing behind the bench saying to myself, I hope it’s not one of those nights when these shots come back to haunt us.”

It was.

The Flames got two goals in the second period to tie the score, but they didn’t put the game away. Montreal’s Brian Skrudland went so far as to suggest that the Canadiens might have actually won the game in the second period by keeping it close even while the Flames were dominating.

Skrudland said: “We didn’t roll over and play dead. . . . Anybody on our team can put the puck in the net, and that makes us a scary team.”

Montreal defenseman Chris Chelios put the game away for the Canadiens with his goal at 8:01 of the third period, beating goalie Mike Vernon with a shot that he slapped from the right circle as he carried the puck into the zone.

“I used the defenseman as a screen and I had a lot of speed on the shot, but as soon as I shot it, I didn’t see it. . . . In the playoffs, you see a lot of goals that you don’t really think should go in. But you have to shoot the puck. I guess we caught them at the end of a shift, and the defense was backing in.”

Crisp said: “Once Chelios put that one by us, they put up their (defensive) blanket. They forced us to open up and, bingo, they put another one past us.”

Montreal’s final goal was scored on the power play by wing Russ Courtnall.

“After the second period, we were scared,” Courtnall said. “We talked it out. Nothing was said about them, only about us. We thought we could play a lot better, and we came out in the third period and played well.”

One of the Canadiens who spoke up between periods was Chelios, a player who, by his own assessment, really isn’t much of a talker. “I thought we needed some other voices in here to get our heads up,” Chelios said. “I didn’t want everybody to get frustrated.

“I had taken some stupid penalties (roughing and cross-checking) and I wanted everyone to know that I wasn’t frustrated, and that those things wouldn’t continue.

“I just said that it was like a zero-zero game going into the third period. We needed to play better, and we could win it.”

The Flames put on a show of strength in the second period, outshooting the Canadiens, 16-4, and getting consecutive goals from Joe Nieuwendyk and Joel Otto to make the score 2-2.

Nieuwendyk’s goal, at 5:14 of the second period, was a slap shot through the slot that went past goalie Patrick Roy and into the back of the net.

Otto’s power-play goal 17 seconds after an elbowing penalty on Skrudland was the result of a second rebound. Defenseman Al MacInnis had bounced a hard shot off the boards behind the Canadiens’ net that went back out front to Mullen, whose shot went off Roy and right to Otto, who tapped it in to tie the score.

Montreal defenseman Larry Robinson had given the Canadiens the early lead, waiting back by the blue line for a pass out after a faceoff and slapping the puck through traffic and between the knees of Vernon, who had dropped to the ice to try to make the stop.

Bobby Smith, like Robinson a veteran of previous Montreal Stanley Cup championships, put the Candiens ahead, 2-0, on his power-play goal at 1:55 of the second period.

It isn’t like the Canadiens to let a two-goal lead slip away. No wonder they needed that heart-to-heart talk between periods.

“We’re not a team to panic,” Montreal Coach Pat Burns said. “We had a good talk after the second period. Chellie was one who was up and talking and showing some leadership.

“He’s one of those guys who works hard all of the time. He won it for the team. He’s a team-oriented hockey player. He has taken a lot of heat in Montreal, for many things. But he’s a professional, and his heart is in Montreal.”

The series now moves to Montreal for Game 3 Friday night and Game 4 Sunday before coming back to the Saddledome for Game 5.

That was as far as it went in 1986. But, then, nobody is even thinking about that.