The Flames collie will impress with a reckless, solid game

RALEIGH — Breaking the silence in a dressing room silenced by a 1-0 overtime loss, Devin Cooley was asked about the opportunity presented to him.

In a season in which the Calgary Flames’ backup wasn’t expected to make more than half a dozen starts by Christmas, his number was called for the fifth time in six games Sunday.

No, Dustin Wolf is not nursing an injury, nor are they resting him.

Coley has just hit his stride, with stats that put him among the league leaders in goals against (1.88) and save percentage (.930).

On Sunday, he was at his best again, keeping the Flames in a tight game against the league’s third-best offense until Nikolaj Ehlers scored the winner three minutes into overtime.

When asked how he managed to break through in such a dramatic fashion, the 28-year-old said his key was letting go.

“I’m laughing, I’m smiling, I’m singing, you know, I’m joking,” Cooley said despite missing his first NHL shutout minutes earlier.

“(Andrey) Svechnikov comes to me and he goes, ‘Give me a goal.’ And I’m like, ‘I don’t want to give you a goal.’ He says, ‘Maybe five holes?’, and I say ‘Maybe’.

He then cited his third-period turnover that prompted him to deflect a centering pass.

“It’s a terrible game by me, but then I go into the corner, I’m like laughing, I’m looking at Wolfie and he’s laughing,” said Cooley, who stopped 16 of 17 shots in the 1-0 loss.

“It just helps you take away the severity of your mistakes and makes the game a lot more fun. That’s when I play my best.”

“When I stop having fun, and I start holding my stick a little too hard, maybe that’s when I can’t play as well, so I just keep trying to have as much fun as possible.”

Such talk is not uncommon in the world of hockey, in which the badge is always the color of the day, and outings are avoided.

As coach Ryan Huska joked recently when asked about Cole’s oversharing, “When I hear things like that, I just think, ‘Golly.’

Craig Conroy thinks the same, but admits that he has been punished for doing so by his wife.

“Even my wife mentions it because I’ll say, ‘Wow, that was a lot,’ and she goes, ‘Craig, you used to say some things,'” laughed the Flames GM, who as a player was of the more colorful, chatty variety.

“Then, I get it, it’s just his personality. But, again, sometimes you’re like, ‘Oh, why do you say that?’ It’s just words sometimes. But then you hear the answer, and people love it. It’s just kind of a breath of fresh air, and he’s been doing it. It’s fun. “

It started with the day he arrived at camp from San Jose two summers ago with a road trip story that included two flat tires, his pet rabbit tattoo and an accident involving a truck carrying canisters of whipped cream.

Each chat is animated, including the recent revelation that during games, he repeats a simple mantra to calm himself: “It doesn’t matter. Nobody cares. We’re all going to die.”

“I’m trying not to think too much about myself,” said Cooley, who went from being the best goaltender in the AHL last season to worse after suffering a nasty midseason injury.

“I think in previous years, and maybe even in the previous season, I was just too focused internally, stressed and second-guessing myself. And now it is, I just focus on what’s happening outside, and what the other team is doing, and trying to have a lot of fun when I play.

“I just continue to learn and continue to improve, and hopefully I can continue throughout the season, because anyone in this league can have 10 good games as a goalie, but the test is if you can do it consistently over a season. So my goal is just to continue to develop and continue to be consistent.”

He’s getting more opportunities to do that, which is a significant improvement for a team that struggled in a preseason that saw Wolf play upwards of 60 times.

“Devin has been really good, so there’s no sense we have to overplay Dustin,” Huska said, explaining his decision to play Cooley.

“We have two good goaltenders now and Devin has proven that we need to see him. He finds a way to get us points and makes key saves at the right time, so you want to reward him.”

Asked if he could understand getting a cluster of starts like this, given his preseason struggles, he shrugged.

“I try not to think about it, you know, and I’ve said it a few times before, like, I don’t care if I play 50 games or five games or I’m not even here,” Cooley said.

“I just want to take things day by day and keep having fun with it. That’s my goal in life, you know? And that’s what gives me energy and what makes me happy, and what makes me enjoy more than anything. And I’m just happy to be here and keep learning and growing.”