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MacKenzie Weegar blasts Calgary Flames' effort in ugly loss

Colton Pankiw
Colton Pankiw
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Nov 8 2025, 1:00 pm
MacKenzie Weegar blasts Calgary Flames' effort in ugly loss
Sergei Belski/Imagn Images

MacKenzie Weegar didn’t mince words when it came to the Calgary Flames’ performance on Friday night.

While the Flames were able to throw 33 shots on net, they were unable to solve Spencer Knight in what wound up being a 4-0 loss.

Though goal scoring continues to be an issue, it was the overall effort of the group that Weegar had a major issue with.

“Half the guys were into it, half the guys weren’t,” Weegar said. “You could feel the sense after the first period, during the first period, it was quiet. Half the guys had some energy, half the guys didn’t.”

It was the third period where things really got away from the Flames, as they gave up a number of odd-man rushes that allowed the Blackhawks to score three of their four on the night.

“I don’t know why we thought we were down four goals going into the third period,” Weegar said. “We just lacked our structure. The first one gets kicked in, second one two-on-one, third one three-on-one, fourth one turnover.”

Weegar’s thoughts seemed to sum up the mood of the entire dressing room. Matt Coronato, who was one of the Flames’ better players with 11 shots on goal, was frustrated by what was another slow start.

“I think all we can do is be prepared every night. I think for the most part, we’ve done that, but I think there’s nights where we’re not ready to go off the jump and it costs us,” Coronato said.

Head coach Ryan Huska, who has been doing his best to stay upbeat despite a rough season thus far, wasn’t able to hide his disappointment about Friday’s outing.

“I wasn’t a fan of our game tonight,” Huska said. “To me, we were slow. There was a lack of execution in a lot of places, with the puck, without the puck. Lots of issues for us.”

Making matters all the worse for the Flames was that they were forced to play more than half the game down a defenceman. Early in the second period, Zayne Parekh took a hard check from Blackhawks forward Nick Foligno and was ruled out with an upper-body injury a short time later.

“He’s going to miss a little bit of time,” Huska explained. “I don’t know the extent of it yet, but we’ll find out some more tomorrow.”

The Flames were also without Kevin Bahl tonight, who wound up sitting out after being ruled a game-time decision after the morning skate. The Flames will hope to have him back in the lineup on Sunday in a road matchup versus the Minnesota Wild.

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