Despite a disappointing season, the Calgary Flames are optimistic about budding talent.
On locker clean-out day, while having their last conversations media ahead of the summer break, many Flames players were looking ahead and focused on the excitement young players bring to the team
“I think it’s exciting when you have guys, especially younger guess with talent and skill, you don’t want to hold them back. You don’t want to put a leash on them, right?” Connor Zary said.
“You need guys to want to go out there and do their thing because at the end of the day, that’s what makes them such exciting and good players. So, it’s exciting to see when a guy like Zayne does something like that and you can really see like, this is what that guy has and this is what that guy can do.”
Zayne Parekh danced around the Los Angeles Kings to score the game-winning goal in the last game of the season on Thursday night.
Captain Mikael Backlund echoed Zary and talked about what the next few months could mean for the Flames’ future.
“This is an exciting summer, a lot of young guys played some good hockey at times this year, and you get some promising players coming up and with an exciting draft and a lot of capital, a lot of good things can happen,” Backlund said.
The Flames have not made playoffs in four years. Calgary finished the 2025-26 season with a 34-39-9 record.