The devil’s in the details for the Flames during their skid

The Calgary Flames weren’t awful against the Colorado Avalanche on Tuesday night. They weren’t great, either. They’ve improved their systems play recently to the point where they’re not getting crushed most of the time. But some key lapses in the details came back to haunt them.

Details of the game: the F3

After the game, Milan Lucic observed that one of the challenges for the Flames in the first half of the game was the “F3” forward. The “F3” is the first forward back on the back-check when transitioning into the defensive zone.

I think a lot of that comes with that F3 forward. When the F3 is good and is able to create that back-pressure and that reload, it allows the D to stay up and cut the…