Calgary Flames hockey is back, but this season carries a different kind of weight. Before the home opener against the Seattle Kraken, members of the media were given a tour of the Saddledome to see how CSEC is getting ready for the 2026-27 Farewell Season, with Susan Darrington, Chief Venues and Entertainment Officer, and Steve Edgar, Marketing Director, leading the way.
The message was clear from the start: this year is about more than what happens on the ice. The Flames are expected to struggle this season, but the hockey itself may end up playing second fiddle to the larger goodbye unfolding around it. The club has 44 home dates at the Saddledome - two preseason games and 42 regular-season games under the extended schedule - and each one is being treated like part of the sendoff.
That sense of occasion is built into the building. The Farewell Season logo sits at centre ice, with the names of every season ticket member placed underneath it, frozen “in the ice as a tribute to their support,” Edgar said.
Farewell graphics and motifs are everywhere, and the home opener sent 20,000 fans out the door with farewell T-shirts. More of those touches are coming as the season rolls on.
For the people working inside the building, the emotion runs even deeper. Peter Mack, one of the Saddledome’s ice technicians, laid ice at the Stampede Corral before putting down the very first sheet in the Saddledome in 1983.
He has now finished the final season’s ice as well. “So this is more than a job,” Darrington said.
“We call this our home, and we’re moving to our new house.”
The game presentation side is leaning into the farewell too. In the booth, the crew scripts each game down to the second from a perch at the end of a catwalk Edgar says offers “one of the best views of the ice surface in the National Hockey League.”
The booth shakes when the crowd gets loud, and it also controls the button that triggers the Flames goal horn. That horn is expected to make the move across the street to Scotia Place.
After 44 seasons, the Saddledome’s resume is impossible to ignore. It has held a Stanley Cup banner in the rafters, carried the mark of a flood on its walls, and even hosted a full season in empty seats. When the final goal horn eventually echoes through the concourse, the people who keep the building running will be able to step back and know their work is done.
Still, the farewell is not just about nostalgia. There is a different energy around the building this time, even with a team that does not look strong on paper.
In past down years, the mood around the club could split the fan base. This season feels more unified, with everyone aware that every game is part of one long last hurrah.
Across the street, Scotia Place is rising, and CSEC is already thinking about what should come with them. The organization is planning what can be transferred from the Saddledome to the new arena, and there has even been discussion about whether fans might have a chance to buy seats from the Dome. The goal is to make the changeover feel natural, not sterile.
“We want to make sure that when people walk into Scotia Place, it doesn’t feel like it has a new car smell… It’ll be beautiful. But it has to feel like home.”
When Scotia Place is finished, it will open a new chapter for Flames hockey and entertainment in Calgary. But for now, the Saddledome still stands across the way, part of the skyline and part of the city’s memory.
The doors will close eventually. Until then, this season is one last chance to live inside the building that has held so much of the team’s history, and so many people’s lives.
In Other News...
Flames Opening Night Disaster Raises One Brutal Early Question
The Calgary Flames did not get the kind of start anyone around the Saddledome wanted to see, opening the 2026-27 regular season with a 6-1 loss to the Seattle Kraken on home ice. Seattle set the tone early and never really let go, while the Flames spent most of the night chasing the game after a rough first period put them in an immediate hole.
What made the performance harder to digest was how many of the problems were of Calgarys own making. Penalties and defensive mistakes kept feeding the Krakens momentum, and the lone Flames goal came only late in the third period after the outcome was long since tilted. For a team trying to establish a better early-season footing, the question now is how quickly this group can clean up the details before one bad opener starts feeling like a pattern. [Read more 🡒]
Flames May Have A Familiar Blue Line Option Back In Play
A familiar name has surfaced around Calgarys system, and it comes with the kind of low-risk depth look teams lean on when the blue line needs a little more certainty. The Wranglers brought in veteran defenseman Derek Forbort on a professional tryout, giving the organization a chance to see where his game is after an injury-plagued year in Vancouver and, from his side, a path toward proving he still belongs in an NHL conversation.
For Calgary, there is at least some built-in familiarity if this turns into more than a camp stop, since Forbort once wore a Flames sweater in 2019-20 and already knows the market and the expectations that come with it. His arrival also fits the broader shuffle around the league, where teams are continually balancing injuries and reinforcements, and it leaves open the question of whether the veteran can turn this latest opportunity into a real contract chance. [Read more 🡒]
Canucks Just Sent A Top Prospect Into A Situation Flames Fans Know Well
Braeden Cootes is heading into the kind of proving ground Flames fans know well, with the Vancouver Canucks assigning their 2025 first-round pick to Abbotsford to begin his pro season. The move sends the young forward into the AHL right away, just as the affiliate gets ready for its opener and finalizes an opening roster that will give a better look at how the club plans to handle one of its most closely watched prospects.
For Vancouver, the decision is clearly about patience and development, not a fast track to the NHL. Canucks GM Ryan Johnson has made it clear there is no set timeline for a promotion, which puts the emphasis on steady growth in Abbotsford rather than immediate pressure in Vancouver. How Cootes settles in there, and how quickly he can turn a strong start into momentum, will be one of the early stories to watch once the season opens. [Read more 🡒]