There’s been a lot of funkiness to the 2022-23 NHL season, but perhaps no team has had a more peculiar start to the season than the Calgary Flames. A trendy pick to win the Stanley Cup and priced around +1500 to hoist the trophy on opening night, Calgary was shot out of a cannon in the first two weeks of the campaign. The Flames won five of their first six games and did it in style against Colorado, Edmonton, Vegas, Carolina, and Pittsburgh.
A stretch like that will always grab the attention of the betting market, and it wasn’t long before Calgary became the second favorite in the Western Conference behind the Avalanche.
Four losses later and the conversation has gone from who can stop the Flames to what happened to the Flames.
Calgary is a slight road favorite against the New York Islanders on Monday night.
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Flames vs. Islanders prediction
While the Flames started the campaign red hot and then cooled off, the opposite is true of the New York Islanders. After dropping four of their first six games, the Isles were in danger of letting another season slip away from them in the early going. Memories of last fall, when the Islanders lost 11 games in a row, flooded the fanbase’s memory after the team dropped three on the spin before a stretch of games against the Rangers, Hurricanes, and Avalanche.
Wouldn’t you know, the Isles would take all three of those contests and then two more for good measure, beating the Blackhawks and Blues on the road before losing in Detroit.
Despite the loss to the Red Wings, it’s hard not to be encouraged by how the Islanders have started the season. Their 7-5 record isn’t going to hop off the page, but the Isles’ underlying metrics show a team that is generally trending in the right direction. The Islanders rank sixth in 5-on-5 goal differential, fourth in 5-on-5 scoring, and boast a 50.8% expected goals rate, which is a marked improvement after they posted a 43% xG rate in their first six contests.
The Islanders are also getting Vezina-caliber goaltending from Ilya Sorokin, who has skated to a .933 save percentage and is third in the NHL with a +11.1 Goals Saved Above Expected, and have a penalty kill operating at 90.5%.
Calgary’s statistical portfolio is pretty much on par with the Islanders. The Flames boast a slightly better expected goals rate and they’re allowing fewer high-danger scoring chances, but they haven’t shown to be the 5-on-5 juggernaut that they were last season just yet. Perhaps the wonkiness of their schedule — this is just Calgary’s second road game and its first outside of Alberta — has caused the team to get a bit stale, but it’s still hard to ignore that this team isn’t firing on all cylinders right now.
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Both of these teams would count their depth as their biggest strength, but Calgary’s is being tested right now with Chris Tanev, Oliver Kylington and Michael Stone all dealing with injuries. That leaves the blueline in rough shape, as the Flames had to call up two players from the NHL for their upcoming road trip.
Calgary’s forward group remains quite potent on paper, but it’s been a tough start to the season for basically every forward besides Nazem Kadri. Darryl Sutter’s been trying to find the right line combinations for his new-look Flames, but it’s yet to pan out and Ilya Sorokin isn’t the goaltender you want to face when you’re fighting it a bit.
Sorokin isn’t the confirmed starter, but he should get the nod after Semyon Varlamov started in Detroit and the Islanders on the first night of a back-to-back. If Sorokin does indeed get the start, the Islanders have value at plus-money.
And if you’re looking for a prop to play, look no further than Mathew Barzal to score a goal. The Isles’ No. 1 center is still on zero goals for the season, but he’s been playing terrific hockey and ranks fourth on the team with 32 shots on goal. At some point, they will start for Barzal, who has 11 assists in 12 games.
Flames vs. Islanders pick
Islanders +105 (Caesars)