The sign held aloft, a clever play on the familiar Obama presidential posters, had one face, one word, one concept:

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Calgary Flames co-owner Harley Hootchkiss tries to console a disappointed Jarome Iginla after the the Calgary Flames' season came to an end on Monday at the Dome.

Photograph by : Dean Bicknell, Calgary Herald

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HOPE.

Yes we can? No, they can't.

In the wake of another first-round failure, the most popular commander-in-chief this oil-soaked plot of land has ever had in office was giving another one of those concession speeches so numbingly familiar at this time of year.

"It's fair,'' Jarome Iginla said of the criticism sure to be coming his way, voice barely audible through a thicket of microphones, notepads and TV cameras. "We're expected to do more. The veteran players. The leaders. We're the ones. I'm the captain. There's a responsibility involved in that.

"I wish I could've done more.

"I didn't do enough.''

No, he didn't. Four points and a minus-four in six games. Not near enough.

In the make-or-break game from a Calgary perspective Monday night, zero points and a minus-two, with only two shots.

First-round exits everyone around here is becoming accustomed to by now. But not having Iginla go out raging at the dying of the light? That's difficult to fathom. Last year in the Game 7 loss in San Jose, for example, he was a raging bull, snorting and sneering and almost personally pulled the Calgary Flames back into the damn game.

Iginla may go down, but it's always swinging.

Monday, he went down quietly, without so much as throwing a punch. He'd chastized himself for a poor Game 5 in Chicago.

He's man enough to admit it. Nobody expects more from himself than Jarome Iginla. Sometimes, though, being Moses isn't the best part in the play.

And this Flames' team, unlike the young, vital Hawks, doesn't have its best days in front of it. Iginla must feel the window of opportunity to right the wrong of 2004 and claim a Stanley Cup has closed, maybe for good.

"Our power play didn't score,'' he muttered. "Theirs did. We had a lot of chances tonight. A ton of chances. But Khabibulin was the difference. Give the Hawks credit. That's a very good young team. But it's still hard to swallow.''

And those injuries, that also counted Dion Phaneuf for Game 6?

"No, no, no excuses,'' Iginla said dismissively. "I thought the guys who stepped in did a great job. Pards played a lot of minutes and real well. Bubba (Anders Eriksson) ... all those guys. It wasn't that.''

Iginla has always been the one to shoulder the load. It's never been fair, but he's always accepted the reality.

"You get a lot of credit when things go well, some of it undeserved, and so when things don't go well, you've got accept what's coming.''

All year, he seemed slightly out of sorts. Those Iginla-esque performances, the ones that linger long in memory, where he lashes the entire bloody group to his back and hauls them out of the wilderness, were fewer than in memory.

And that trend carried over into the post-season. Usually playoffs to Iginla what Christmas is to the kiddies or happy hour was to W. C. Fields.

Maybe he was banged up and we didn't know it. Or maybe his back has finally given out. From all the heavy lifting over all the years.