The Battle of Alberta at the Saddledome

Calgary against Edmonton is the most intense rivalry in the NHL. It's a 90-minute drive; it's two cities that disagree about almost everything; and the Saddledome has been one of the two places where the Battle of Alberta plays out for forty-three years. Every Flames-Oilers home game has been a sellout since 1983.

Why the rivalry is what it is

Calgary and Edmonton are 290 kilometres apart on Highway 2. They're both Alberta cities but they're built on different self-images. Calgary is the cowboy city, Stampede city, oil headquarters; Edmonton is the government city, university city, festival city. They've fought over which is the provincial capital (Edmonton won, 1906, and Calgary has not entirely accepted it). They've fought over CFL teams (Stampeders versus Eskimos, now Elks). They've fought over economic gravity. None of those fights compares to the hockey one.

From the late 1970s, when Edmonton joined the NHL via the WHA merger, until now, the Battle of Alberta has been the Canadian hockey rivalry that produces the most intense games. The 1980s version, when both teams were among the league's elite, was the most violent and consequential era in modern NHL history. The Saddledome was one of the two buildings where that played out.

The 1980s peak

The 1980s Oilers had Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier, Jari Kurri, Glenn Anderson, Paul Coffey, Grant Fuhr. They won five Stanley Cups (1984, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1990). The 1980s Flames had Lanny McDonald, Joe Mullen, Doug Gilmour, Al MacInnis, Mike Vernon, Joe Nieuwendyk. They won one Cup (1989) and reached two Finals (1986, 1989). Both teams were genuinely championship teams.

The two teams played four playoff series in the 1980s. Edmonton won three; Calgary won the most consequential one, 1986, the Steve Smith own-goal series.

Game 7, May 1986: the Steve Smith own goal

The 1986 Smythe Division Final between Calgary and Edmonton went seven games. Game 7 was at the Northlands Coliseum, not the Saddledome, but the Saddledome had hosted the previous home games and was where Calgary fans watched on television. The score was tied 2 to 2 in the third period. Edmonton defenceman Steve Smith, on his 23rd birthday, attempted a clearing pass from behind his own goal line. The puck banked off goaltender Grant Fuhr's skate and went into the Edmonton net.

That own goal ended the defending Stanley Cup champions' season. Calgary went on to the Cup Final, where they lost to Montreal. Smith has said since that the play "still haunts me," and Edmonton fans have never quite recovered. For Calgary, the 1986 series was the moment the Battle of Alberta became something the city believed it could win.

The 1991 series

Calgary and Edmonton met in the first round of the 1991 playoffs. The Flames had finished second in the division; Edmonton, fourth. The series went seven games. Edmonton won. The most memorable moment from the series, by far, was Theo Fleury's goal in Game 6, scored at the Saddledome, which Fleury celebrated by sliding the length of the ice on his stomach. The image is still on Calgary t-shirts.

After 1991, the Battle of Alberta playoff series went away. Both teams declined through the mid 1990s. Calgary's 2004 Cup run was against Vancouver, Detroit, San Jose, and Tampa Bay; Edmonton wasn't a factor. Edmonton's 2006 Cup Final run was against Detroit, San Jose, Anaheim, and Carolina; Calgary wasn't a factor. The two teams went thirty-one years without meeting in the playoffs.

The 2022 playoff series

The 2021-22 season produced the first Battle of Alberta playoff series since 1991. The Flames had won the Pacific Division under Darryl Sutter; the Oilers had finished second. The second-round series was, somehow, even more intense than the regular-season hype had promised. Connor McDavid scored at will. Johnny Gaudreau did the same. The teams traded haymakers for five games. Edmonton won the series 4 to 1. The deciding game was at Rogers Place.

For both fan bases, the series was a reminder that the rivalry's energy had not gone away across three decades of dormancy. The Saddledome rocked for the home games of that series in a way the building hadn't rocked since the 2004 run. The 2022 series remains the most recent peak of the rivalry as a playoff event.

The atmosphere at the Saddledome on Battle nights

Every regular-season Flames-Oilers game at the Saddledome since 1983 has been a sellout. The crowd is louder. The boos for the Oiler players are sharper. The cheers for any Calgary goal are bigger. There's an unwritten rule that visiting Edmonton fans should sit quietly; many do, some don't, all eventually do. The building's acoustics, which are not great by modern standards, are good enough that 19,289 people screaming is a sustained roar that the players say they can feel.

What happens to the Battle when the Saddledome comes down

The rivalry continues. Scotia Place opens in 2027 as the new home for the Flames. Edmonton's Rogers Place is already eleven years old. The two cities will keep playing each other twice a season at minimum, and presumably continue meeting in the playoffs from time to time. But the building where the 1980s Battle of Alberta was felt by Calgary fans, the Saddledome, will be gone. Future Battle of Alberta games will take place at Scotia Place. They'll be loud. But they won't be in the same room.