Matthew Tkachuk scored two goals and Brett Ritchie added another with two assists in a career-best three-point game as the Calgary Flames earned a 6-2 home victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Wednesday in the season finale for both teams.
Dillon Dube scored a goal in a two-point outing, while Andrew Mangiapane and Connor Mackey also scored in the win, and goaltender Jacob Markstrom made 19 saves for the Flames (26-27-3, 55 points), who finished the season winning four of five games.
Derek Ryan netted three assists for the Flames, who won seven of 10 meetings this season and finished fifth in the North DIvision.
Bo Horvat and J.T. Miller replied for the Canucks (23-29-4, 50 points), who ended up as the last-place team in the North. Goalie Braden Holtby stopped 22 shots.
Both teams failed to reach the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Tkachuk sent the host team off and running to a three-goal opening period, with his first goal at the 7:41 mark. It came on a redirect of Johnny Gaudreau’s pass from deep in the zone to run his goal-scoring streak to five games.
Dube doubled the lead at the 12:16 mark when he sped around Quinn Hughes, drove to the net and slipped the puck through Holtby’s legs for his 11th goal of the season. Mangiapane tallied in his fourth consecutive game by pouncing on a rebound for his career-best 18th goal of the season, with 3:42 left in the first period.
Ritchie extended the lead to 4-0 five minutes into the middle period when he found the mark from the top of the slot for his fourth goal of the season, after which the Canucks finally showed life.
Horvat’s power-play goal to finish a perfect passing play – his 19th of the season – put the Canucks on the scoreboard at 8:34 of the second period, and Miller deflected Boeser’s point shot 58 seconds later to cut the lead in half.
Tkachuk quashed any Vancouver comeback hopes less than a minute later when he buried a one-timer for his 16th goal on the season. Mackey’s first NHL goal four minutes into the third period rounded out the scoring.
Gaudreau’s pair of assists gave him 10 points (one goal, nine assists) in a five-game point streak. Gaudreau, who struggled for much of the middle of the season, finished the season with 22 points in the last 16 games.
Dube left the game in the second period with an undisclosed injury. He is scheduled to play for Team Canada at the coming world championships.
–Field Level Media