Flames are out of excuses for poor performances, according to veteran defenseman Nikita Zadorov
Nikita Zadorov is not one to pull punches, and he didn’t hold much back about his team’s struggles.
As Zadorov and the Calgary Flames look to snap their losing skid against the New York Rangers at home on Tuesday, the big defenseman called out some of his unnamed teammates for their performance to start the season.
Zadorov said players who pinned last season's struggles on now-fired head coach Darryl Sutter had best look in their mirrors.
“Now there’s no Darryl, so there’s no excuses,” Zadorov told the assembled media after the morning skate. “You guys don’t like hard coaches. You don’t like soft coaches. You don’t like good coaches. Fair. It’s a new-day league. You come up here, you play hard and you just leave everything on the ice. That’s how simple it is.”
The Flames (2-3-1) are back in action after a five-game road trip in which they collected only one victory. There have been myriad issues for the team’s struggles, and Zadorov said one of them is a lack of a team-first game.
“We have too many individuals playing by themselves. We’ve got to figure out if we want to play as a team or if we want to play as our own guy,” he said.
"We’re only six games into the season and we’re trying to figure out who wants to be here, who wants to play for who,” he added.
Coach Ryan Huska was told about the comments, and said he doesn’t believe some of his players are being selfish.
“Sometimes, it’s trying to do a little bit too much,” Huska said. “You get into stretches where you want to help the team win— ‘We’ve got to find a way to get a goal at this point of the game’ — so you try a little bit too much instead of making the smart, simple play.”
The Flames had an optional morning skate, after an optional practice on Monday, so any lineup changes will not be known until just before puck drop. It does appear forward Dryden Hunt will play his first game of the season, with AJ Greer the candidate to come out of the line-up, and Jacob Markstrom is slated to start in goal.
Here is the expected lineup for the Rangers:
Forwards:
Chris Kreider-Mika Zibanejad-Kappo Kakko
Artemi Panarin-Filip Chytil-Alexis Lafreniere
Will Cuylle-Vincent Trocheck-Blake Wheeler
Barclay Goodrow-Nick Bonino-Jimmy Vesey
Defense:
Ryan Lindgren-Adam Fox
K’Andre Miller-Jacob Trouba
Erik Gustafsson-Braden Schneider
Goal:
Igor Shesterkin
Jonathan Quick
ICE CHIPS: The Rangers have lost their last four visits to Calgary, including a 3-2 overtime affair last season … Shesterkin’s career record against the Flames is 0-2-0 with a 5.50 goals-against average and .851 save percentage … Markstrom has posted a 9-2-2 mark against the Rangers with a 2.48 GAA and .915 SvPct. … Fox, the 2021 Norris Trophy-winning defenseman who was originally drafted by the Flames but refused to sign with Calgary and was traded to the Hurricanes in the deal that brought C Elias Lindholm and D Noah Hanifin to Calgary, has four assists in five games against the Flames, along with a minus-2 rating.