If you asked me how the Calgary Flames’ 2025–26 season has been going, the obvious answer would be terrible. But not for the reasons you might think. Sure, the Flames are currently dead last in the NHL standings by a landslide. And that may be enough for someone to believe that is why the season is going poorly. For me, however, the reason is the Flames’ usage of their younger players within the lineup.

It has been over a month of hockey to this point. Head Coach Ryan Huska is still burying his young talent low in the lineup or in the press box. No player has seen it worse than Connor Zary. He was fully expecting to take a step forward in his development this season after dealing with injuries last year. None of that has happened, partly due to his performance, but mostly due to the coaching staff’s mind-numbing decisions.

We saw a scenario like this play out not that long ago with a former Flame. That is now two-time Stanley Cup Champion and Conn Smythe winner Sam Bennett. The Flames fumbled around with Bennett so much, and the minute he was free from the shackles of Calgary, he went on to become a prominent piece of the now back-to-back champions in the Florida Panthers.

Could the Flames be heading down this same route with Zary? Well, let’s try to figure that out.

Where did the Flames go wrong with Bennett?

Before we get into how Zary has been misused, we have to go over how Bennett was handled when he was a Flame. Most of us already know the story, but it is worth revisiting for the sake of this article. Bennett was the highest draft pick in Calgary Flames history, going fourth overall in 2014.

Bennett’s rookie season in 2015–16 was seen as a success. He scored 18 goals and had 36 points on a Flames team that finished in the bottom five that year. Everything seemed like it was going up from there. But from 2016 until he was traded in 2021, Bennett was never given a defined or long-term role.

He would bounce between playing on the team’s second line with Matthew Tkachuk and Mikael Backlund. He would sometimes ride shotgun with Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan. But his role was often to play on the wing on the team’s third or fourth line for most of his time in Calgary.

Bennett was drafted as a centre, but he was rarely given a full-time role down the middle of the ice. We saw him get that chance and run with it exactly one time: the 2020 playoffs inside the bubble. Bennett played alongside Dillon Dube and Milan Lucic and was the Flames’ best player in the playoffs that summer. It looked like he finally found himself a role that he excelled at, and he accepted that’s what he was going to be in the NHL.

Back to square one, then traded

Then the 2021 season began, and Bennett would find himself without a role once again, bouncing throughout the lineup. He started the year on the fourth line, then was back with Monahan and Gaudreau. Then, once again, back to the fourth line, and eventually scratched.

Everything came to a head when he was traded to the Panthers later that season. He instantly became an impact player for them, playing down the middle with a Panthers version of Jonathan Huberdeau. It was the change of scenery he needed. He is now a pivotal piece of the Panthers and just secured himself a $64M contract back in June.

The Flames went wrong in a lot of ways with Bennett. Sure, he needed to be better sometimes, but he was jerked around so much that he could never find a groove, and all confidence was lost on his end. They gave him a huge opportunity in Florida, and they didn’t rescind on it the minute he made one mistake. They let him grow in that role with ample time, and it ended up paying major dividends for the Panthers.

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What has gone wrong with Zary’s development

I will be the first to admit that I never thought that Zary would develop into a superstar. That was never what he was projected to be, and it would be unfair to him to put those kinds of expectations on him.

When Zary broke into the league, though, he did look like he would be a very good top-six forward. He played a majority of that year on the wing, but he was given reps at centre when Elias Lindholm was traded earlier that season. Like Bennett, Zary was drafted as a centre. He has seen some time there, but mostly has played the wing, especially after the Flames decided to bring in Morgan Frost last season.

Zary has seen a lot of different linemates over the past three seasons. He broke into the league alongside Nazem Kadri and Martin Pospisil. He’s played the middle alongside Huberdeau. And he’s gotten the chance to play alongside Backlund and Blake Coleman from time to time. This season, however, he has shifted around the lineup too much already. He now sees himself playing on the fourth line between Ryan Lomberg and Adam Klapka.

Zary not getting enough runway

It is nice that Zary is playing the middle of the ice right now. But the issue is he is playing fourth-line minutes, getting little to no power play time, and is playing with two players who are barely NHL players at this point in time. There is only so much a player can do with suboptimal lineups and extremely limited ice in a game to get to where he wants to go.

Zary isn’t playing his best hockey right now, and sometimes a demotion is warranted. However, there are players higher up in the lineup getting more opportunities than he is who have played much worse in my opinion—Yegor Sharangovich, I’m looking at you.

The Flames need to put him in a position to succeed. Much like Bennett, he is being moved around too much; he has spent two games in the press box and is playing with linemates that aren’t up to snuff.

What can the Flames do to help Zary be successful?

The answer is pretty simple, really: put the player in a position to succeed, and leave him there. The Flames have to give Zary a long, extended run in the top-six, and they can’t make a rushed decision to move him back onto the fourth line if he makes a mistake or two. Preferably, you would want Zary playing down the middle. But until they move a centre out—maybe Kadri—there isn’t a spot for him in the top-nine to play. So playing him on the wing will have to do for the time being.

Ideally, the Flames begin to move out some forwards. They have had way too many for some time now. With how poorly the team has performed, beginning to sell off pieces for future assets would do them some good. It would create more opportunities for players like Zary or guys on the Calgary Wranglers to get ample playing time.

Show Zary you are confident in him

The biggest thing the Flames need to do is to show they have confidence in Zary. Where it all went wrong with Bennett is when they stopped showing that they trusted him. Once the trust went out the window, Bennett had no reason to stay or to show he cared. The Flames cannot make the same mistake with Zary.

He is a young player who has some of the best skill on the team, and can be a producer for them. They need that player in their lineup if they want to succeed down the line. This cannot turn into another situation where they move him because he is unhappy, and he lights it up elsewhere. The Flames need to develop Zary in the best ways they can.

That starts with the head coach; Huska needs to put Zary in a spot where he can play his game and learn that it is okay to make mistakes.

Time to commit

With another loss last night separating the Flames from the pack a little bit more, it is time to commit to the youth and let them run with it. I know management and ownership don’t want to admit it is time to rebuild, but now is the time to give the younger players more rope and let them take the reins of the team.

Zary will be a big part of that, and it really is time now to give him the opportunity that he deserves.

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