On Tuesday morning we ran the numbers on the first 0-5 start in Flames history. That night in Anaheim they won, 4-2, and two nights later Mark Stone scored three in Vegas. The first Overtime below is the list of every bad start the franchise has had and how each one ended, with Tuesday added. Then the Saddledome's opening night as the Herald's columnist logged it, one first at a time, and the notebook of a North Dakota fan who drives 95 miles each way to watch Flames prospects. Three Overtimes, none of them on the site.

This week

Zero Points and a Waived Forward: Inside the Numbers of the Flames' Historic 0-5 Start (Rinkside Dispatch, Taylor Brooks) Outscored 27-8 on nearly even shots, what Elliotte Friedman actually said about Calgary, why Connor Zary was waived, and whether Ryan Huska is the coach for a rebuild.

Bev Ritchie's Building (The Scrapbook, Riley Quinn) Forty-three years ago Thursday, the Saddledome opened, months late and $16.5 million over, with a name a maintenance worker and his son came up with. The first page of The Saddledome's Last Yee-Haw.

190 Miles, One Massive Tattoo, and a Front Row Seat to the Future Flames Lineup (View from the Nosebleeds, Brian Williams) A North Dakota season ticket holder on watching Cole Reschny and Carson Carels from the top of the Ralph.

Overtime: The 0-5 start

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The bad starts, and how they ended

The article gives franchise history one sentence. Here's the rest of the list.

Before this season, the worst start in Flames history belonged to the 1997-98 team. Five games, no wins, three losses and two ties. It finished 26-41-15 and missed the playoffs.

That season has a footnote worth knowing. On January 5, 1998, the Chicago Blackhawks played the Flames, and a 22-year-old forward named Ryan Huska got 5:51 of ice time. It was the only NHL game he ever played.

Three others opened 1-4:

• 1975-76, in Atlanta: 1-4. Finished 35-33-12 and made the playoffs.
• 2015-16: 1-4. Finished 35-40-7 and missed.
• 2025-26: won the opener in Edmonton, then lost four straight. Finished 34-39-9 and missed.

Three more opened 1-3 with a tie. One of them is worth a look: the 1983-84 team played 11 playoff games that spring.

So the history cuts both ways. A bad October has been survived. It has also, more often than not, been the first chapter of a season without a spring.

The part Huska won't enjoy: the two most recent bad starts are both his, and they came back to back.

Since Tuesday. The first win came that night. In Anaheim, Adam Klapka and Aydar Suniev scored, the Ducks tied it 2-2, and Martin Pospisil put Calgary ahead at 15:38 of the third. Yegor Sharangovich made it 4-2. Dustin Wolf stopped 23 of 25 in someone else's building, close to the quiet road night we called his real test last week. Two nights later in Vegas it was 6-2, with Mark Stone scoring three times in the third period. The Flames are 1-6 and home to Carolina on Sunday.

Overtime: Bev Ritchie's Building

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First Nighters

What didn't fit on the page: the column the Herald ran under the game story, the day after, the players on the new corners, and the rest of what Bev Ritchie had to say.

Larry Wood's list. The morning after the opener, the Herald's sports columnist ran the night as a list of firsts, good, bad and ugly. Some of it, as he had it:

• The first snafu came half an hour before the game, when one of the two passenger elevators stalled. "Somebody," a nerve-wracked operator told him, "was locked in here for 45 minutes earlier today."
• The first eyecatcher on the Saddle Room menu was Linguini Alle Vongole, $4.75.
• First pre-game jitters belonged to Cliff Fletcher, who at 5:08 p.m. was heard to say, "It must be time to get on with the game, right?"
• The first act was the building's pigeons, which Wood suspected might be the Olympic Doves.
• The first note was struck by an organist on loan from the Vancouver Canucks.
• Missing on night one: TV monitors, ashtrays and coat hangers on the press catwalk, water in the upper-level washrooms, and the out-of-town scoreboard.
• The first player introduced was Grant Fuhr, "all the way from Spruce Grove." The first faceoff, at 6:17, went to Doug Risebrough over Ken Linseman.
• First bodycheck: Lanny McDonald on Kevin Lowe. First shot on goal: Jamie Macoun, on a solo rush.
• His "first tight-lipped steely-eyed reunion": Tim Hunter, meet Dave Semenko.
• First in the penalty box: Paul Baxter, for roughing Dave Lumley, who had done the initial shoving.
• The first appropriate musical number was "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," with Bill Currie on the trumpet.
• His first impression was "Not exactly a $100 million entertainment vehicle."

The open house. On Sunday the doors opened to everyone. CBC's crew reported that for 12 hours thousands of people walked through the two lounges and the 33 private suites, watched pee-wee hockey, and bought popcorn and soft drinks by the gallon on the concourse.

The corners. The players noticed one thing the fans didn't: the new building's round corners. "The corners were bigger in the Corral," Reggie Lemelin said. "It gave the defence more time to make the plays. Here, they have to get rid of the puck quicker. It's an advantage for our forecheckers, it's a disadvantage for the defence." Steve Konroyd thought the boards were deader too. "The puck tends to stay on the boards more," he said. "I think when we get used to it, we'll like it better, but it'll probably take half-a-dozen games to get the hang of it."

The rest of Bev Ritchie. He was born in Canmore and had lived in Calgary since 1958. "I've lived in quite a few cities in Canada, but there's nothing to compare with Calgary," he told the Herald. He planned to share the season tickets with Darrell, his son, for supplying half the name. "Lately, I've felt lucky," he said. "I'm living pretty well and I'll enjoy life even more with the season tickets." The Olympic organizers' objections did not move him. They were in no position to criticize, he said, since they hadn't sent in an entry. "I'm standing behind the name 100 per cent."

Overtime: View from the Nosebleeds

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Brian's notebook

What didn't fit in the Q&A: a note Brian sent with his answers, the captain's weekend in the box score, and the road trips already on his calendar.

The line about Carels. With his last three answers on Saturday night, Brian added a note about the one he "wasn't sure how to word." Here it is: "While he didn't have any points this weekend, he was absolutely everywhere on the ice. Always seemed to be in the right place at the right time. If he would not have been in the lineup for either game, I am positive the outcomes would have been different. He may not put up Ethan Wyttenbach numbers, but I think he is just as impactful." Both wins were by one goal: 3-2 at Bemidji State, 4-3 at the Ralph.

The faceoff. After the exhibitions, Brian wrote that he couldn't remember the last time he saw a defenceman take a faceoff. The Augustana box score from Oct. 3 has Carels at one for one in the circle.

The captain's weekend. Reschny scored twice on Friday at Bemidji State, the second the winner at 15:21 of the third. On Saturday he set up Will Zellers' power-play goal. Over the two games he had 13 shots and won 19 of 31 faceoffs.

The drive home. Brian thinks he missed one game last season. "The only games I do not make is when the highways are closed due to blizzards," he wrote when we first asked him, "and even then it's 50/50 on whether I drive on closed roads." On game nights, he wrote, "I actually have to work immediately following the game, so once it's over I hurry up and drive the 90 miles home and head into work for the night."

Still Wiebe fans. Abram Wiebe was his wife's favourite player, the one who got her into hockey. "We are definitely fans of his, and hope he doesn't stay with the Wranglers too long." The Friday before the piece ran, Wiebe played beside Mike Benning in Connor Zary's Wranglers return. That Sunday he had two assists against Bakersfield, the first on Rory Kerins' goal in the second and the next on Ben Jones' goal in the third.

Where he'll be. Every home game at the Ralph, the series in Omaha in January, and Austin on Halloween for Michigan State. He has already booked his plane and hotel for the Frozen Four.

Last season from his seat.

Abram Wiebe at a fan fest signing table. Photo: Brian Williams

Cole Reschny signing a jersey, September 2025. Photo: Brian Williams

Wiebe in warmups at the Frozen Four. Photo: Brian Williams

What we cut, and why

Pierre Trudeau being booed on opening night. Peter Maher remembered it in 2024: the prime minister on the ice for the puck drop and booed hard. It is a good story and we told it, as his. What we did not do is print it as fact, because we went looking and could not find it. The next morning's Herald has Lougheed, Klein and a federal minister cutting the ribbon, and NHL president John Ziegler and Frank King dropping the puck. The Wikipedia line that says Trudeau was booed cites a Herald column that does not say so, and CBC's 1983 report does not mention him. If you were there and remember, reply to this email. We would love to know.

Coming up

The Flames are home to Carolina on Sunday at 6 p.m. On Tuesday, Tales from the Sin Bin returns with Sandy McCarthy's Title Belt, the first of three on McCarthy and the Bob Probert rivalry.

Tuesday: Sandy McCarthy's Title Belt. Illustration: Flames Scout Wire Planned for Friday is the page Bev Ritchie's Building promised: the first Battle of Alberta, October 22, 1980, at Northlands, with Jim Peplinski against a 19-year-old Mark Messier.

From the archive

Peter Maher's Yeah Baby Night: the voice of the Flames for 33 seasons, whose memory of the Saddledome's opening night is in Thursday's piece. His booth in the building is named for him.