He didn’t keep track, but the number was big. Like, really big. Nearly every team, in fact.

Calgary Flames boss Jay Feaster figures he fielded calls from 25 — “and maybe more” — general managers, all curious about the availability of Curtis Glencross.

Those inquiries, however, were fruitless.

Because No. 20 is not going to budge, despite the keen interest.

Nor is Mark Giordano.

Ditto T.J. Brodie and Sven Baertschi.

Beyond the aforementioned four skaters, Feaster declined to offer the identities of those considered untouchable by the Flames. But it’s hard to imagine there are many more. If any.

“It’s a small list, it’s a small list,” Feaster acknowledged an hour after the expiration of the National Hockey League’s trade deadline. “We’ve made a decision that we need to go in a different direction. Every guy’s in a different situation, in terms of what their contracts look like, how much money is on the contract, how term is left . . . but clearly that list of guys that we wouldn’t consider (trading), it was shorter than in years past.”

Nevertheless, as eager as the local manager had been, Wednesday turned out to be relatively peaceful.

After a week in which the Flames hocked Jarome Iginla and Jay Bouwmeester, the day produced a single swap in Calgary — Blake Comeau to Columbus for a fifth-round pick.

Feaster was asked if he had expected to get more accomplished before the 1 p.m. horn.“You know what? You never know,” he replied. “Certainly, I thought that there were some things that we put out there, some players that we put out there, that I thought might be attractive, depending on how things went down for some other teams. I’m at the point now where I don’t know if I ever have an expectation one way or another. We just see where it’s going to go.”

Not surprisingly, with the Flames very publicly in sell-mode, there had been no shortage of (potential) action.

Vultures were circling.

“We made a lot of phone calls, we took a lot of phone calls,” said Feaster. “Would it have been nice if we could have done other things and wheeled a couple more second(-round picks)? Sure. When you’ve made the decision that we’ve made, stockpiling assets is an important thing. Yet, as we know, it takes two teams to get a deal done. Sometimes, you just don’t have a trading partner.”

Discussing the difficulties of doing deals these days, Feaster pointed to Wednesday’s quip from Vancouver Canucks goalie Roberto Luongo, who, still untraded, had announced that his “contract sucks.”

“That’s just a great comment from a player as to what’s going on,” Feaster said. “I don’t think it’s an indictment of talent that nothing more happened (on deadline day). I think with every one of these, it’s no longer just about the player and the talent of the player. But it’s about contract situations. It’s about term. It’s about money. It’s about cap space.”

Lack of fireworks, yes, but this is only one day.

The teardown, freshly started, surely continues.

Even if pressure from the top remains the same.

“(Owner) Murray Edwards told me that he expects to be in the playoffs next year — so there’s my marching order,” said Feaster, whose club is on the brink of its fourth straight post-season absence. “It’s a process. We understand where we are. We understand what’s ahead of us. But from the standpoint of the organization, the expectation, this is not one where you say to the players, ‘Well, we’re in some full-blown rebuild model. Don’t worry about it. Don’t worry about winning. Don’t worry about improving. Don’t worry about competing.’ Again, no excuses.