The Arizona Coyotes suffered a brutal 6-2 defeat on Thursday night against the Calgary Flames in what was arguably one of their worst losses of the season. 240111_Tourigny_Postgame Going into this game, the Coyotes were coming off an emotional 4-3 overtime win versus the Boston Bruins. They played a ferocious, relentless and inspiring brand of hockey as the team was riding high. Their performance on Thursday night did not emulate that whatsoever. Twenty seconds into the contest, Clayton Keller committed a turnover in the offensive zone which led to a Yegor Sharangovich goal. The Coyotes would give up three other goals in that period including one short-handed. After the fourth goal, Karel Vejmelka was pulled for Connor Ingram. By the time the first period buzzer sounded, the Coyotes trailed 4-1. Lawson Crouse scored the team’s lone goal. Arizona attempted to mount a comeback in the second period, playing with a bit more passion and cut the lead to just 4-2 off of a Keller goal. However, the Coyotes fell flat in the third as they repeated their mistakes from earlier in the game and allowed Sharangovich to complete a hat trick. It was the first period that drained all momentum from the Coyotes which is starting to become a common theme. “At some point it’s our responsibility, it’s not the first time we struggled with our first period,” coach André Tourigny said. “I think that’s on the coaches and the leadership to take charge of those things and we failed. Following the game, Jason Zucker was quick to take responsibility and appeared to just be angry with himself. “Terrible,” Zucker said of how he performed. “I was awful. I let the guys down, I was terrible all night.” The Coyotes looked like the team of old. They turned over the puck constantly, had no offensive spark and were careless defensively. It’s just disappointing to see this kind of performance when just two days prior, Arizona beat one of the top playoff contenders in the Eastern Conference. Consistency has been a struggle for the Coyotes all season long and if they aren’t going to fix it, the playoffs may be just a pipe dream especially with the rise of the Edmonton Oilers and Seattle Kraken. The Coyotes are set to go on a three-game homestand in hopes to get themselves back on track.
