The Flames’ to-do list is very short heading into opening night

The Calgary Flames are enjoying a rare stretch of consecutive days off the ice this weekend, a brief respite before a pretty hellacious regular season schedule that’s compressed due to the 2026 Winter Olympics in February.

The last gate for the Flames to clear before opening night in Edmonton on Wednesday is filing their season-opening 23 player active roster with the league on Monday afternoon.

The state of things

As of now, here’s how the Flames’ training camp roster sits:

• Forwards [14]: Jonathan Huberdeau, Mikael Backlund, Morgan Frost, Yegor Sharangovich, Blake Coleman, Justin Kirkland, Matt Coronato, Adam Klapka, Connor Zary, Matvei Gridin, Ryan Lomberg, Martin Pospisil, Joel Farabee and Nazem Kadri
• Defencemen [8]: Rasmus Andersson, Kevin Bahl, Jake Bean, Joel Hanley, MacKenzie Weegar, Daniil Miromanov, Zayne Parekh and Brayden Pachal
• Goaltenders [2]: Devin Cooley and Dustin Wolf

So… they need to remove one player from the active roster before 3 p.m. MT on Monday to meet the roster limit.

Option A: Someone goes on waivers on Sunday (for assignment on Monday)

Of the 24 players in camp right now, only two don’t require waivers to be removed from the active roster: Zayne Parekh and Matvei Gridin – we’ll talk about them later. That means anybody else would need to be placed on waivers on Sunday, clear waivers on Monday and then be sent to the Wranglers before 3 p.m. MT. (If they were claimed off waivers, that would achieve the same objective.)

So if there are no Flames on waivers on Sunday, they’ll be looking at Options B or C…

Option B: Someone waiver exempt gets demoted by Monday

Again, the only waiver exempt players on the active roster are Parekh and Gridin.

Parekh is subject to the CHL transfer agreement because he was drafted from a CHL team, so he can only be sent to the OHL and once he’s sent down, he cannot come back until his junior team’s season is completed. While Parekh had some rough nights during the pre-season, he’s going to be given every chance to be a regular this season based on how excellent he’s been in the OHL.

Gridin was not drafted from a CHL team and so he’s eligible to play in the AHL (in addition to the NHL and CHL), so the Flames have a lot more flexibility with how they move him around this season. He was one of their best players in training camp but he’s played zero professional games and unless he’s playing regularly, he may be better off with the Wranglers.

Option C: Someone is placed on the injury reserve list by Monday

Late in Wednesday’s game, Jonathan Huberdeau barrelled head-first into Vancouver netminder Kevin Lankinen. Huberdeau was on the ice for awhile before being helped off. Generally-speaking, the NHL has a specific protocol for players that have suffered suspected head injuries or concussions, and the return to play protocol takes around a week. On Thursday, Flames head coach Ryan Huska classified Huberdeau as out day-to-day.