Bill Clement

Last season Calgary squeaked into the playoffs, landing the eighth and final spot in the Western Conference by one point. This season it might not be so lucky.

The Flames started the year with big expectations, fueled in part by the hiring in June of Mike Keenan as coach. But so far the Flames have fanned on those big expectations. They've been a big disappointment for several key reasons which must be costing Keenan considerable sleep as he attempts to get things turned around before it's too late.

Miikka must be the man
The last two seasons the play in goal of Miikka Kiprusoff concealed a lot of Calgary's flaws. The unflappable Finn hasn't performed poorly this season, but he hasn't been all-world like he was in his first three seasons in Calgary. If there is even a slight dropoff in Kiprusoff's performance it begins to expose his team's flaws. And as stellar as the goaltending is in a very competitive Western Conference, the Flames can't afford Kiprusoff not being at his best on a consistent basis.

The quality of goaltending in the Western Conference is truly remarkable. Besides the goalies who are perennial top performers like Kiprusoff, Roberto Luongo, Marty Turco, Evgeni Nabokov, and Jean-Sebastien Giguere, there's the resurgent Chris Osgood, Manny Legace, Nikolai Khabibulin, Pascal Leclaire, Chris Mason, and Ilya Bryzgalov, who is now in Phoenix. In the Western Conference if a team does not have a top-notch puck-stopper it's likely not going to make the postseason.

Coming into the season Kiprusoff was as sure a bet as any goalie in the league to be really solid, but he has lacked the consistency he's been known for in the past. While he's been better of late, Kiprusoff still has the lowest save percentage (.886) of the 30 goalies in the NHL who have played the majority of their team's games. Kiprusoff needs a few solid games in a row to regain his form of the last couple of seasons. If he gets back to that level the Flames could take off.

Defensive demise  
The blame for Calgary's disappointing first two months of the season can't all be placed on Kiprusoff. Too much of the time the Flames are disorganized in their own end. In front of Kiprusoff Calgary lacks defensive consistency and is prone to big mistakes. Defense was always a hallmark of Calgary teams, but the Flames rank 24th defensively. Penalty killing has been one of Calgary's biggest deficiencies as the Flames have allowed goals around 25 percent of the time while playing shorthanded.

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Very often the Flames appear confused on defense. On many nights it looks like they are not on the same page. It's Keenan's responsibility to make sure Calgary's defense is organized and has a sound defensive system. But Keenan has never been a system driven coach. He wants emotion, energy, combativeness and competiveness. It's hard to win in today's NHL with just those qualities. Teams need a comprehensive defensive system.

Every player wants to be coached. Every player wants to know what is expected of him in every situation. If a team has a system that provides the players with a foundation of understanding how to play in every situation and how to play as a unit in every situation it will be successful. It's really hard to play in the NHL without a defensive system to fall back on when things aren't clicking on the ice.

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