Long-time Calgary Flames goaltender Miikka Kiprusoff will have his jersey number retired by the team next season, according to a media release this morning. Kiprusoff’s number 34 will be the fourth in franchise history to receive the honor, and the ceremony will take place on March 2, 2024, before a game against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
One of the greatest Finnish netminders of all time, Kiprusoff played nine seasons and nearly 600 games for the Flames across the late 2000s and early 2010s. His goaltending oversaw one of the more sustained periods of success in recent years for the Flames, highlighted by a run to the Stanley Cup Final in 2004 and a Vezina Trophy win in 2006.
That 2004 run is the defining achievement in Kiprusoff’s career – and it came before he had solidified himself as the full-time starter he’s remembered as. His 38 games played in the 2003-04 regular season was a career-high, but his .933 save percentage and league-leading 1.69 goals-against average that year was good enough to earn him second place in Vezina voting despite the lack of playing time.
He stepped it up a notch in the postseason, taking the Flames to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final with a 15-11 record, .928 save percentage, 1.85 goals-against average, and a league-leading five shutouts. They would eventually lose to the Tampa Bay Lightning despite holding a 3-2 series lead thanks to Martin St. Louis’ Game 6 overtime heroics and a two-goal performance from Ruslan Fedotenko in Game 7. In the process of getting to the Final, Kiprusoff became the only goalie in NHL history to defeat three division winners in the same postseason.
After the 2004-05 lockout, Kiprusoff would become nothing short of a workhorse. He played at least 70 games in the eight following seasons, consistently sitting near the league’s top in most statistical categories throughout that run. He played just 24 games in his final season, the 2012-13 lockout-shortened campaign, before calling it a career.
“I am honored and humbled by this recognition of my career in Calgary,” said Kiprusoff. “To have my name and number hanging next to those great Flames players, and especially my friend and legendary goalie Mike Vernon is truly a highlight of my career.”
In hindsight, the seemingly menial trade that brought him to Calgary at the time is now one of the most consequential in franchise history for both teams. After several seasons as a backup to Evgeni Nabokov with the San Jose Sharks, the Flames acquired him for a 2005 second-round pick early into the 2003-04 campaign. The Sharks would select defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic with Calgary’s pick, arguably the greatest shutdown defender in Sharks history (even if he is in a steep decline now) and their all-time leader in games played by a defenseman with 1,239.
Kiprusoff remains the Flames’ franchise leader in games played (576), wins (305), saves (14,631), shutouts (41), and save percentage among goalies with at least 50 games in a Flames jersey with a .913 mark. Among Finnish netminders, only Pekka Rinne has won more NHL games.
He joins Lanny McDonald’s number 9, Jarome Iginla’s number 12, and Vernon’s number 30 atop the rafters of the Scotiabank Saddledome.
Missed their chance to make it March 4th
The practice of retiring numbers has always been unusual to me. What happens when you retire too many numbers? Can you un-retire them? Like how Yahoo closed a bunch of dormant accounts to free up usernames?
I think it’s a measure of honor, and well deserved.
Also, mathematically: this is the fourth number retired in the 44-year history of the Flames, an average of one every 11 years. Assuming that the contract limit stays at 50 (needing 50 numbers available to prevent repeats) and counting #99 as unavailable, at the rate they’re going the Flames would run out of usable numbers in…2530.
Well deserved!