Flames Have Something Interesting Brewing in Their Crease

Sometimes the interesting part of a hockey story isn't the player who is starting the game. It's the player sitting beside him. That's what caught my attention with the Calgary Flames' decision to continue alternating Devin Cooley and Dustin Wolf in goal. Cooley is expected to get the start Thursday against Colorado, which means the Flames are sticking with the rotation they've used to begin the season.

I'm not sure that's a bad idea. In fact, I kind of like it.

Cooley's first start was so-so, but not horrible.

Cooley's first start didn't go particularly well. He stopped 22 of 25 shots in Vancouver during a 4-1 loss. That's hardly the kind of performance that gets anybody excited about a goaltender. But it wasn’t horrible either. And the bottom line is that one game shouldn't tell us very much about a goalie. Especially a goalie who is sharing the crease for a team that hasn’t won a game so far this season.

The more interesting question for Calgary might be what happens if both Cooley and Wolf play well enough to make the decision difficult. That's a pretty good problem to have. It would sure take the edge off the Flames’ seeming inability to score goals.

Wolf is obviously the more familiar name to Flames fans. Plenty of attention has been on his development, and there are reasons to believe he could eventually become the organization's long-term answer in goal. But “eventually” is an important word.

The Flames don't have to decide everything right now.

They can let Wolf play. They can let Cooley play. They can see how each responds to pressure, bad games, good games and the inevitable ups and downs that come with being an NHL goalie. And maybe that's the real story here. Fans often tend to want teams to identify their No. 1 goalie immediately. We want the starter. We want the backup. We want the depth chart neatly arranged.

In NHL hockey, sometimes you need to let competition sort things out. The Flames need a win, and it seems the first goalie to provide it might have a step up. Cooley's loss to the Canucks doesn't suddenly make him a bad goalie. And Wolf getting another opportunity doesn't mean Calgary has already decided everything about the future.

For a team that's still figuring out exactly what it is, having two goalies competing for playing time might actually be useful.

There is something to be said for making players earn their opportunities.

And there is something else to be said for giving them enough opportunities to actually show what they can do. So I'll be watching the Calgary crease a little more closely. Not because I think Cooley is suddenly the answer. And not because I think Wolf is guaranteed to be the answer.

But because the Flames may be doing something fairly sensible here: letting the answer develop instead of demanding that they already have one.