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CALGARY — For Canada's neophyte NHL teams — which is to say any without the long and storied history of either the Montreal Canadiens or the Toronto Maple Leafs — Game 7s have a way of defining the face and future of the franchise.
Take the Calgary Flames for example. More than a quarter of a century after landing here from Atlanta, most of their lore centres around two years — 1989, when they won the Stanley Cup for the one-and-only time in their history, and 2004, when they came within one victory of winning it again.
Both times, the Flames won a seventh game in the opening round — in overtime, no less — to start them down a long and successful playoff path.
Without those seminal Game 7 victories, there would be little history of consequence to talk about. In 1989, a loss in the opening round to a Vancouver Canucks team that finished 43 points behind them in the standings would have resulted in massive personnel changes at every level. It was odd therefore that two of the principles in that memorable season — Canucks' coach Bob McCammon and Flames' general manager Cliff Fletcher — were both in the Pengrowth Saddledome again this past Sunday, interested spectators for Calgary's 2-0 shutout win, which forced a seventh-and-deciding game in their current playoff series against the San Jose Sharks.
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- Calgary Flames
- Montreal Canadiens
- New York Rangers
- San Jose Sharks
- Toronto Maple Leafs
- Vancouver Canucks
- Jarome Iginla
- Miikka Kiprusoff
In 2004, a team that featured both team captain Jarome Iginla and goaltending star Miikka Kiprusoff, the journey to the seventh game of the Stanley Cup final didn't result in a championship, but it did help to reignite interest in what had been a flagging NHL team. The Sea of Red was born, sellouts have been routine ever since, and right now, there is a long line of people willing to pay mega-dollars to watch a single playoff game in the opening round. Naturally, the price will go up, if the run continues.
Of course, the tide can turn the other way, too. In 1994, the Flames lost a Game 7 to Vancouver, which propelled the Canucks to the Stanley Cup finals for the second time in their history. There, the Canucks ran into Mike Keenan and the New York Rangers, who sneaked out one of the most entertaining championship wins of all time. Predictably, that series went seven games as well.
This will be Keenan's 10th time coaching in a seventh game (he has a 5-4 record). Three went to overtime.
So Keenan is well-versed in the history of seventh games and thinks they are important because, "If you can get beyond the first round, exponentially, you can grow as a team. That would be an important factor."
Iginla too knows something about how seventh games define players. The Flames played two seven-game series in the 2004 playoffs and the second one — in Tampa, a loss in the final game of the season — is a disappointment he carries with him to this day.
Overall, the Flames are 5-6 in seventh games and Iginla played in three of them — one win and two defeats. On Monday, prior to their departure to San Jose, Iginla was accentuating the positive — and remembering how the overtime win over the Canucks in '04 galvanized the team and spurred them onto an electric playoff run.
"That Vancouver series was close and extremely physical," Iginla said. "A lot of us who've been here together, we're going to draw on that series. We know what it did for us when we were able to win; and what it does as far as momentum, to give you a boost and to keep rolling. So we don't have to say it's a big game; potentially, we know if we can get this game, it'd be a huge boost going into Round 2. And that's what we want. We've been saying all series that we believe we can win this. We've put ourselves in that position — now we want to go out and do it."
As a franchise, the Flames have had an unusual all-or-nothing playoff history for more than 20 years now. Except for one season, 1987, in which they lost in the second round, the Flames — in the past 23 years — are either one-and-done (nine teams since 1986), or have gone all the way to the Stanley Cup final (in the three other years they made the playoffs).
So if the past is any indication, this could either be the start of something big — or just another semi-interesting footnote in franchise chronicles. It all hinges on one game, a seventh game, and the chance to add a new chapter to an up-and-down playoff history that frankly could use a little freshening up right about now.
