It was the first goaltender fight in the Battle of Alberta’s history, an unexpected statistic considering the history between the two teams. Still, after a heated match-up between the Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers on Saturday, Cam Talbot decided to accept the challenge and square up with Mike Smith at center ice.
Technically, Smith didn’t “challenge” Talbot. Still, if a goaltender is standing at center ice as the rest of his team gets into a number of scrums, the assumption is there. Talbot was already heated after what he deemed a questionable play by Sam Gagner after the whistle to try and score and had taken a few shots at the Oilers forward. Smith figured enough was enough and simply waited until defenseman Darnell Nurse pointed out to Talbot someone had a message for him.
Talbot skated up to center, the two dropped the mits and Talbot lost a decisive bout between the two.
Talbot told the media after the game, “It was just, again, one of those things, an emotional reaction. I was already in a couple scrums and then I saw him just standing there, so it was just one of those things, just react to it.” He added, “I didn’t expect to get thrown out of the game for it, thought it would just be a five-minute major.” Talbot said he felt bad it forced Rittich to go back in net and that he put his goaltending partner in that spot.
Talbot admitted that he’d never been in a fight before, other than in juniors and that he was surprised to hear he was one-half of the first goaltender duo to fight when Calgary met up with Edmonton.
Kelly Talbot Weighs In
Cam seemed to handle himself well in the media despite a bad loss to the Oilers and a bad loss in a fight. But, he wasn’t the only one to comment. His wife, Kelly, took to social media calling out Edmonton “fans” trolls for giving her and her husband a hard time.
She wrote that Cam felt he needed to fight in that situation because if he didn’t he’d have been called out for being scared. She then said she didn’t miss a portion of the Edmonton fans who are seemingly never happy.
We agree with Kelly that if Edmonton Oilers fans are giving her a hard time, they should probably back off. She has nothing to do with it and despite the fact Cam lost to a grizzly veteran in Smith (who, by the way went after Milan Lucic last season), Cam showed up for the fight. Not every goaltender would have.
Related: Kreider’s Injury Shouldn’t Affect Trade Potential
Karsten Feigel
February 3, 2020 at 7:21 pm
Nah us Oiler fan won’t back off the Talbots and the Flames can eat ?