{"id":179459,"date":"2025-09-30T06:16:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T06:16:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/179459\/"},"modified":"2025-09-30T06:16:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T06:16:07","slug":"flames-takeaways-gridin-and-wolf-steal-the-show-and-the-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/179459\/","title":{"rendered":"Flames Takeaways: Gridin and Wolf steal the show, and the win"},"content":{"rendered":"

CALGARY \u2014 As Matvei Gridin<\/a>\u2019s confidence grows, so do his chances of sticking around.<\/p>\n

As if the 19-year-old Calgary Flames<\/a> hopeful wasn\u2019t making enough of an impression in Seattle Monday with a goal in his second straight game, Gridin punctuated the evening by adding the shootout winner in a 2-1 win over the Kraken.<\/p>\n

Winding his way into Seattle\u2019s zone by taking slow, wide turns at either side, he then flashed the shot that has Flames brass so excited, roofing it past Philipp Grubauer to kickstart a celebration that saw the self-assured youngster tuck his stick into his holster before being mobbed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would say it\u2019s a Gridin Signature, like (Justin) Kirkland\u2019s Signature,\u201d he chuckled.<\/p>\n

\u201cI scored like five goals last year in the shootout like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gridin, a first round pick of the Flames in 2024, was the QMJHL\u2019s rookie of the year with 36 goals and\u00a0\u00a079 points in 56 games.<\/p>\n

A soft-spoken Russian who may just have the best shot\/speed combination of any Flames prospect, Gridin\u2019s game has been building throughout camp.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Intrigued by Gridin\u2019s talents, coach Ryan Huska placed him on the top line with Morgan Frost and Matt Coronato Monday. By far the team\u2019s best trio all night, it was responsible for the team\u2019s lone regulation goal when Gridin took a slick pass from Ilya Solovyov, skated in alone and unleashed a rocket past Grubauer.<\/p>\n

\u201cAmazing pass by Solo, a breakaway so I\u2019ve just got to score,\u201d laughed Gridin.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know my shot is my strength, so shoot more and find the back of the net. Playing with Frosty and Matty builds my confidence up, so I felt nice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gridin\u2019s co-star on the night, Dustin Wolf<\/a>, enjoyed seeing the NHL debut of the \u201cGridin Signature.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI hadn\u2019t seen the shootout yet, until today, but I could tell taking it slow and taking it wide he knew what he was doing,\u201d said Wolf.<\/p>\n

\u201cPretty neat release. Excellent shot. Every day he picks your corners. He\u2019s going to score a lot of goals in this league.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although he\u2019s still junior-eligible, Gridin is also eligible to play in the AHL this season where he\u2019s likely to open the season. However, if he continues to impress like he has the last few outings there\u2019s an outside chance he could open the season in the bigs.<\/p>\n

It’s a longshot as one of the other tough decisions Flames brass must make revolves around Rory Kerins, who is the team\u2019s second-leading scorer, with four points in five pre-season games. Kerins was 8 of 13 in the faceoff circle Monday and would be a risky player to try putting through waivers for the purposes of returning him to the AHL.<\/p>\n

Gridin doesn\u2019t require waivers, so he would most likely start in the minors and be eligible for promotion later on.<\/p>\n

No one was sharper Monday than Wolf, who made 16 of his 35 saves in the first period when the flat-footed Flames allowed 10 high-danger scoring chances.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey came out hard in the first and we found our footing as the game went on,\u201d said Wolf, who will make one last pre-season start Friday at home against Winnipeg.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a great step for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Frost continues to impress, pacing the Flames\u2019 top line once again, spearheading the top power play, scoring in the shootout and finishing 11 of 13 in the faceoff circle. His assist on Gridin\u2019s goal puts him amongst NHL pre-season leaders with six points in four outings.<\/p>\n

Speaking of league leaders, former Flames prospect Matthew Phillips has three pre-season goals in Anaheim, one off the pace set by Sonny Milano.<\/p>\n

Martin Pospisil was in vintage form, drawing penalties and the ire of Vince Dunn (once again) on a night when he was in the fray regularly.<\/p>\n

For the record, Kirkland used his signature move in the shootout, but hit the post.<\/p>\n

The Flames shooters were Frost, Kirkland, Coronato and Gridin.<\/p>\n

Gridin \u2013 Frost -Coronato
Farabee \u2013 Kerins – Klapka
Lomberg \u2013 Kirkland – Pospisil
Honzek – Morton – Suniev\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bean \u2013 Pachal\u00a0
Kuznetsov \u2013 Brzustewicz
Solovyov\u00a0\u00a0– Cicek\u00a0<\/p>\n

Flames host Vancouver Wednesday<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CALGARY \u2014 As Matvei Gridin\u2019s confidence grows, so do his chances of sticking around. As if the 19-year-old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179460,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-179459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179459\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}