There’s no real reason for Dustin Wolf to be playing an inordinate number of games this season.
Sure, the Calgary Flames know he can do it. In the spring, Wolf started 15-of-19 crucial games as the Flames pushed for a playoff spot and gave them a chance to win in every one of them.
Now, though, what’s the point in over-extending him?
The Flames begin November sitting in dead-last in the NHL standings. Wolf hasn’t been the problem, but there do need to be realistic expectations set on what the team is going to be able to accomplish this year.
If they’re not going to be making a push for the post-season, there’s no reason to drive Wolf into the ground by playing him 65 games or more.
And, based on the way, Devin Cooley has played in his two starts this year, the Flames have a reliable backup they can count on to make sure Wolf gets enough rest to keep him at his peak performance level. He has been playing a lot so far and it might be time to ease him back a bit.
“It’s not always the easiest thing when you’re not playing quite as much as you’d probably like to as a backup goaltender, but that’s the job and you have to make sure you stay ready,” Flames head coach Ryan Huska told reporters post-game after the Flames fell to the Ottawa Senators in a shootout on Thursday evening. “I think the work that (Flames goaltending coach Jason LaBarbera) and Devin have put in, it’s been really good for us.”
Only a month ago, there were serious questions about whether the Flames could feel confident putting Cooley between the pipes. Back then, they were expected to push for a playoff position.
The conversation has changed, for two reasons.
First, the Flames are in last place.
Second, Cooley actually has shown he can play well enough to give them a chance.
There’s no risk to giving him more playing time and getting Wolf a little more rest. The Flames coaching staff will do everything they can to get the Flames back in the playoff hunt, but Cooley has shown that playing him won’t hurt that goal.
He beat out Ivan Prosvetov for the backup job in training camp, but just barely. He posted a 4.08 goals-against-average and a .846 save percentage in pre-season, and it was reported by reliable insiders that the Flames were scanning the trade market to see if they could acquire a different backup.
When Huska opted to roll with Wolf in both games of a gruelling two-games-in-24-hours, back-to-back on the road against Edmonton and Vancouver, it didn’t exactly signal that the team had much confidence in Cooley.
Did that rattle the 28-year-old?
“Not at all,” Cooley told Postmedia. “I was fully confident in my ability. I knew.
“Basically, you’re just waiting for an opportunity because I knew once I got in there, it was going to be like ‘OK, yeah, we don’t need to worry.’ There was no doubt in my mind that I was going to have a good first game. I think I showed that.”
Cooley finally got a start on Oct. 15 against the Utah Mammoth, the Flames’ fifth game of the year. He was their best player on an underwhelming night, turning away 29 of the 31 shots he faced in a losing effort.
He also has appeared in relief for Wolf once, in a blowout loss to the Vegas Golden Knights on Oct. 18, and then got another start on Thursday against the Ottawa Senators.
Cooley turned away 35 out of 38 shots in the nation’s capital, giving the team even more reason to feel comfortable that they can call his number when they need to.
And it’s notable, too, that Thursday’s game wasn’t the second in a back-to-back. The Flames hadn’t played on Wednesday and, with games on Saturday against the Nashville Predators and Sunday against the Philadelphia Flyers, he’ll almost certainly get another start over the weekend.
“I have a lot of experience being a backup and I’ve had a lot of experience going two weeks without playing,” Cooley explained. “I think that’s going to help me a lot because it’s nothing new for me. I know what the role takes and I know what I need to do in order to be successful. It’s just jumping back into that role.
“It’s been good so far. It’s just trying to stay ready as much as you can and give the team a chance when you get in there and supporting Wolfie and working hard and doing extra work.”
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Wolf inevitably will get the vast majority of starts for the Flames this season — as he should. Pushing him beyond the point where he is at his peak performance level doesn’t make sense if the team is nowhere near playoff contention, though.
He currently has started 10 of the Flames’ 12 games, putting him on pace to play 68 games this season. Last season, not a single NHL goalie played that many games.
There’s no doubt that Wolf would play every game if he could. This isn’t the NBA we’re talking about, where star players skip games voluntarily for load-management reasons. Wolf’s proven at every level, from junior to the AHL to the NHL, that he can handle a heavy workload.
But there’s no reason to force that on him if the Flames aren’t anywhere near the playoffs.
Cooley’s early season play should allow them to keep Wolf a little more rested.
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