Flyers Sweep Home-and-Home series against Habs, head into Olympic break on 4 game win streak
The Flyers are holding on to the sixth spot in the Eastern Conference heading into the Olympic break, and it’s all because they’ve swept the competition this past week. They finalized things Saturday night with a commanding victory over the Montreal Canadiens. The game was expected to be a blood bath after Friday night’s match-up ended in a brawl, but aside from a few fisticuffs, and a scrap between Ian Laperrière and Ryan O’Byrne just four seconds into the game, it was a fairly calm evening in Quebec.
The fan favorite, and I use the term lightly, in Montreal, Danny Briere, scored his fourth career hat trick to help lead the Flyers in a 6-2 rout over the Habs. Briere hasn’t had a hatty in two years, but he said it felt nice to do it in front of family members, friends, and of course, the lovely Montreal fans casting boos down onto him. Danny scored his hat trick on a beautiful penalty shot move after being tripped up by Ryan O’Byrne late in the third period.
Jeff Carter, Mike Richards, and Blair Betts also added tallies for the Flyers.
The Flyers put in one of their best games I’ve seen in awhile, and because of it, their special teams finally clicked. They were two-for-four of the power play, and even managed a shorthanded goal as well.
Michael Leighton again put in a stellar effort, again reminding me why I think he should be this team’s true number one goalie. He just seems to be extremely confident. We’ll see if Laviolette decides to ride him after the break. I wish he would. Emery just hasn’t been the same since his injury.
The Flyers are 6-2 in their last eight games. Definitely something to be excited about for after the Olympic break. Hopefully the two weeks off doesn’t ruin any chemistry this team had going for them. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
Just because the NHL is on Olympic break doesn’t mean we are. We’ll be reporting on the Olympics, and more specifically, the Flyers in the Olympics, as the games begin on Tuesday afternoon. Stay tuned!
Flyers Down Habs 3-2
The Flyers opened up a true home-and-home tonight in South Philly versus the Canadiens. Fresh off two come from behind wins over the Devils, the Flyers would look to move up in the very tight Eastern Conference race. Michael Leighton was again in goal for Philly while Carey Price was in for Montreal. Jeff Carter would get the Flyers on the board first, late in the first period. Briere picked up the orginal rebound from Carter and sent it out in front where Scott Hartnell had a few whacks at it, only to be stuffed by Price. But Carter found the loose puck and slipped it by Price for the 1-0 lead. The Flyers stormed out in the 2nd period scoring twice in two minutes. Carter added his second to make it 2-0, and Matt Carle scored to make it 3-0. The Flyers seemed to be in command at this point. But they would come out a bit flat in the 3rd and let Montreal tget it back to 3-2 with goals from (former Flyer, noticing a theme here folks?) and newly acquired Dominic Moore. Both the Habs goals seemed to come from our in ability to clear the puck from the zone. Metropolit’s goal seemed to bounce high off the glass, and nobody could find it, except for him. With a minute left, Darroll Powe laid out Jaroslav Spacek behind the Montreal net. The play resulted in 5min major and Game Misconduct for Powe. The hit didn’t look especially dirty or anything, as Spacek turned just as Powe came in to hit him. Spacek’s status is unknown. Montreal pulled the goalie for the remaining time, but was unable to capitalize. And the Flyers pulled out a 3-2 win. As the game ended a scrum ensued, with Gionta and Gomez the lead antagonists for Montreal. Have to wonder what they were thinking mixing it up with Pronger and Lappy. The whole thing lasted a few mintues until the men in stripes were finally able to separate everyone. No doubt Montreal sticking up for Spacek and sending a little message for tomorrow night.
All around a pretty good effort tonight, save for that spurt early in the 3rd period. The Power Play continued to struggle, failing to convert on numerous chances in the 3rd period. Leighton looked sharp in goal once again. Jeff Carter continued his fine play, adding two more goals. The Flyers are right back at it again tomorrow night in Montreal, for the final game before the Olympic Break.
Flyers sweep home-and-home with Devils in overtime
Simon Gagne finally snapped his 12 game goalless streak Wednesday night with a dominant shift in overtime, wristing home the winner over the left shoulder of Martin Brodeur. After missing with a shot just seconds earlier, Gagne skated around Ilya Kovalchuk and Patrik Elias before letting go of the game winner in the slot. The Flyers also received goals from Arron Asham and Jeff Carter. Michael Leighton gave up two first period goals, albeit softies, to Travis Zajac and Rob Niedermayer, but settled down to stop 21 shots for the victory.
The Flyers managed to win a game down 2 goals against the Devils for the second straight game in a row, while only mustering a total of 15 shots on goal. The first period started off with those two fluky goals, but the Flyers got a huge response from former Devil Arron Asham to make it a close game. The Devils certainly squandered their fair share of scoring chances, with prized acquisition Ilya Kovalchuk “Jeff Cartering” a few shots off of the glass/wide, and Travis Zajac missing an empty net as well. The hot topic of debate was Scott Hartnell’s no-goal that would have tied the game at 2 at the end of the first. While physics may have told you that the puck was in, the NHL’s war room saw things differently. Cue the “MSG+ didn’t send the correct camera angle” theories.
Jeff Carter buried a wrister off the iron in the second to tie the game, so the no-goal didn’t exactly hinder the offense. Earlier in the day, Carter received the news that he would be a part of Team Canada, as Ryan Getzlaf suffered an ankle injury earlier this week which will put his Olympic status in doubt. The Flyers had a couple of breaks in this game, with Zach Parise missing the game completely due to an upper body injury (which isn’t good for Team USA :/). The Devils also lost Bryce Salvador early on, as he took a high stick in the defensive zone, leaving with vision problems. The Flyers played relatively disciplined, but special teams weren’t the key point of this game. Leighton coming up with the big stops certainly was the highlight of the game, with Gagne’s goal being the icing on the cake.
Upcoming notes: The Flyers play another home-and-home set against Montreal this weekend, before the Olympic break takes over. The Opening Ceremonies for the Games is tomorrow for our Olympic followers. Ray Emery will get 3 weeks, including the Olympic Break, to rest his ailing hip.
A comeback against Brodeur? With our offense? Nooo…
It happened, folks. Five minutes into the second period, I said to myself, “This game is over.” The Flyers offense looked terrible. Passes weren’t being completed and the simplest of breakouts and defensive plays were being terribly misplayed. It was a miracle that the score was as low as it was at that point in the game.
Shortly after that, Jeff Carter delivered a debatable hit to Anssi Salmela (I’ll have more on the hit later in the post), just a split second after he put the Devils 2nd goal behind Michael Leighton. The hit seemed to be the energy boost that the Flyers needed, as terrible as it sounds to say that. From that point on, it was all Flyers. James van Riemsdyk got the Flyers on the board early after a crafty move and shot beat the NJ defender and flew by Martin Brodeur. Seconds later, Jeff Carter finally hit an open net on a 2-on-1 pass from Scott Hartnell.
When the third period started, the Flyers came out and showed that they were the better team and wanted to win this game. Mike Richards broke the tie on the power play on a pretty pass from Kimmo Timonen was dished out from behind the goal line. That was all the Flyers needed to beat the Devils tonight.
Once the Flyers woke up tonight, they showed us a great defensive effort and they generated a ton of offensive opportunities. When you’re playing a goalie like Martin Brodeur, you’re going to need all the opportunities you can get. Michael Leighton was awesome in goal tonight, too.
Part two of this home and home series is Wednesday night in New Jersey.
As for the hit, here’s a video of it first.
This hit looked so much worse in the arena and until I got a few more looks at it, I was convinced that it was a dirty hit on Carter’s behalf. Once we slow down the replay, though, it’s not as bad as people are going to make it out to be. Is it a suspendable hit? Probably, but not deserving. Anssi Salmela was skating through the slot with his head down. As hockey players in peewee, we’re taught not to do that. Always be aware of your surroundings, and have your head on a swivel at all times. Salmela did none of those.
The argument that everyone will bring up here is that it was a late hit, but was it? Had Leighton made the save, the rebound would have been right on Salmela’s stick for an easy tap in had Carter not pushed him off the puck.
It’s a tough call to make, but we’d like to know what you think. Drop a comment down below.
Oh, by the way, our podcast debuts tomorrow! Stay tuned for that! Goodnight everyone!
Sleeping Flyers lose to Minnesota, 2-1
Two mistakes by Michael Leighton, sleeping offense, and a stunning performance by Anton Khudobin. That’s the story of tonight’s game. And that’s really all I’m going to talk about here.
In his first NHL start, the rookie Anton Khudobin made 38 saves on 39 shots. A lot of those shots were put right into his chest, though. The Flyers made Khudobin look better than he probably is. Or maybe he’s good. Who knows. I don’t.
As I said, there were a lot of shots put into the chest of Khudobin. The Flyers need to acquire someone who can put the puck into the net. And they need to do it fast before they’re too far down in the standings for it to matter.
Michael Leighton was at fault for both goals tonight, but those weren’t the reason for the loss tonight. The Flyers can’t score. You must score goals to win hockey games. Michael Leighton kept the Flyers in the game tonight. Easily making up for his mistakes.
I don’t have much else to say. I’m sorry. I don’t want to go off on a tangent about how I think the Flyers need to rebuild their team and stop relying on free agency, because that’s just stupid right now. But, fuuuuuck.
Former Flyer buries his old team late in game, Flyers fall to Oilers, 1-0
The Flyers just lost to the NHL’s worst team. The Flyers just lost to a player they used to call their own. Ryan Potulny buried the Flyers tonight with just 16 seconds left in the game, after Darroll Powe was taken to the box on a high sticking minor. The Flyers traded Ryan Potulny for Danny Syvret, and Potulny now has 12 goals – just as many as Scott Hartnell.
Defensively, the Flyers showed up again tonight. They held the Oilers off of the scoreboard until the final minute of the game and were suffocating for the second straight game. Michael Leighton was fantastic, but he was given no support from the Flyers offense. The Flyers had 30+ chances to bury the puck tonight, and failed to capitalize on any of them. That’s the reason the Flyers lost tonight. Claude Giroux had a golden opportunity, but rang a shot off of the post. I don’t mean to discredit Jeff Deslauriers, either. He played a phenomenal game and was a huge reason that the Oilers came away with a W tonight.
Ray Emery was scratched prior to tonight’s game and it has been reported that he’s experiencing some soreness in his groin. Was scratching him tonight precautionary, or is there a larger problem that will keep Emery out of action for longer than we’d like? I’m all about the Leighton train, though. Let’s see where he takes us, if Emery is indeed injured.
The Flyers finish out their western road trip on Saturday against the Wild.
Richards, complete defensive effort shut down Flames, 3-0
Tim Panaccio must have been watching a different game tonight. Or, he’s been reading too much Eklund the last two days. Or, shit, I don’t know, but he’s not too bright right now. In his recap article of tonight’s 3-0 shut out against the Calgary Flames, Panaccio writes: “The 3-0 victory was anything but pretty hockey against a Calgary team that had won just once in its past 10 games.” Timmy, the Flyers held the Flames to under 20 shots, didn’t allow them to score one goal, answered every defensive test that came their way, and had possession of the puck for a large amount of tonight’s game. If that’s not crucial to helping your club win a hockey game, then I’m not entirely sure what is, and maybe you should be the coach of this team. Automatic Stanley Cup? Unless I’ve mistaken your wording for something other than what it really is, c’mon man.
Tonight was the first of three games out West for the Flyers. They’ll follow up this performance with a game Wednesday against the Edmonton Oilers who beat up on the Hurricanes tonight, and then close out the trip against the Minnesota Wild on Saturday night.
In a game where the opposition was facing several line-up changes, the Flyers did the best they could to shut them down entirely. When the defense couldn’t make the stops they needed to make, Ray Emery was up to the task. Emery stopped every one of the 18 shots that came his way en route to the 3-0 shut out and looked like a “game-changer” tonight. He also seemed to regain a sense of his rebound control and puck movement tonight as well.
Mike Richards was by far the Flyers best player tonight. Richards scored his 100th and 101st NHL goal (21st and 22nd on the season) and was an aggressive piece of the forecheck. If I had to give Mike Richards an evaluation for tonight’s performance, he’d get an A+. He didn’t look lethargic, lost, and confused on the ice. He didn’t seem to not care at all. He didn’t make terrible line changes on the back check, and he was part of almost every scoring chance that his line developed.
Claude Giroux had another noticeably good outing, which included an extremely nifty backhander on Flames goalie Miikka Kiprusoff. Giroux fooled Kipper into believing that he was bringing the puck back to his forehand, but never actually made the switch back and, at the last second, lifted the puck right over Kipprusoff’s shoulder on the back hand. Claude Giroux continues to amaze me night after night. There’s no telling how good the kid’s going to be two or three years from now. Bill Clement put it perfectly during CSN’s TV broadcast when he said that Giroux “will never beat you with the same move twice,” and that he is always “creating his moves based on the play that is developing around him.” It’s so true. The creativity and vision that Giroux carries goes unmatched on this team, and maybe in the NHL as a whole.
Two other Flyers who also played noticeably good games were Arron Asham and Matt Carle. Carle’s been struggling as of late and tonight’s game will only help his confidence heading into the Olympic break. Like I keep saying, Asham continues to be an underrated forward. The skill set that he carries aids Giroux and JVR so well, though. It’s so fun to watch them play together.
Did I really go this long without mentioning the stellar play by the newly acquired Lukas Krajicek? I did, didn’t I?
Krajicek logged 18:25 of ice time tonight and earned every one of those minutes. Many Flyer fans and writers were skeptical about Krejicek’s signing, but I think with tonight’s effort, he’s at least earned another game. He didn’t make many mistakes that I saw and he always seemed to be in the right spot at the right time. Was this just a case of playing with a new team and being overly excited, or is he just the piece that the Flyers needed to take some of the stress off of Chris Pronger and Kimmo Timonen?
The Flyers are back in action Wednesday night at 9:30EST in Edmonton, Alberta when they face-off against the Oilers in the second leg of this road trip.
While you’re waiting for Wednesday, be sure to check out the news on the new WeBelieveInOrange Podcast that’s launching next week!
Better late than never! Flyers barely edge Isles, 2-1
My apologies for the lack of a recap after the game yesterday. I was away all weekend without internet access and neither Anthony or Ryan were around to cover the game, either. These things happen, I guess. We were one of the first Flyers blogs to break the Krajicek signing, though. Love us for that, please.
Anyway, I’m glad that CSN replayed this game. I missed the majority of it while attending the Philadelphia International Auto Show. Good times. Even though the show gets smaller and smaller every year. Signs of the times, I suppose. On to the game.
Peter Laviolette shuffled the lines going into Saturday’s match-up to try and find some offensive spark. Darroll Powe played on the first line with Carter and Briere, while Scott Hartnell was flipped to the other side of the ice and played alongside Gagne and Richards. It didn’t take too long for the new lines to find the twine. Late in the first, Darroll Powe would use his speed to chip the puck into the offensive zone and blow by the Islanders defender (I forget who it was – kill me) and play the puck in behind the net. Briere would come in from the opposite side and pick up the loose puck and make a quick wrap-around move to put the puck past Islanders goalie, Dwayne Roloson.
The Flyers second and final goal came from a Mike Richards shot that was beautifully redirected by Scott Hartnell who was standing alone at the side of the net.
Obviously, an NHL game wouldn’t be the same if I didn’t have officiating to complain about. In the second period, Kimmo Timonen took a slapper from the point that beat Roloson. Kerry Fraser, who was properly positioned in the corner of the rink, pointed towards the net and had awarded the goal to the Flyers. A split second after the puck had gone into the net, momentum carrying him forward, Scott Hartnell plowed into Dwayne Roloson and knocked him over. Roloson was furious after getting up and immediately charged to the corner to protest. Rob Martell, who was the center ice official, skated into the corner and discussed with Fraser that the goal should be disallowed and that Scott Hartnell should go to the box for goalie interference. That happened. Somehow. Even though the puck was in the net before Hartnell ran into Roloson, Kerry Fraser signaled that Timonen’s shot was a goal, and the play was dead, somehow, this call would be reversed. The Islanders would go on the power play and score on it which game them a lot more momentum than they should have had.
I don’t want to get into the rules and the rest of the blah blah blah, because I’m tired of it. The NHL really needs to work on its officials. Someone needs to take action when this kind of shit happens, before it costs someone a really big game.
Ray Emery was up to the task for the rest of the game when the Flyers fell asleep, and that’s the only reason the Flyers won this game. It was a sloppy win, but it was a win, nonetheless.
The Flyers are in Calgary tomorrow night to face the new Calgary Maple Leaf….I mean Flames, who no longer have Dion Phaneuf on their roster thanks to a slew of Sunday morning trades. It’ll be interesting to see how that plays out for the Flames, and how badly it hurts the Laffs.
Flyers give up effort…I mean, the lead, and lose to the Thrashers. Again…
Remember earlier in today’s preview when I said the Flyers have been playing better hockey as of late? Yeah, I lied. Ilya Kovalchuk, Evander Kane, and Jim Slater made the Flyers look like complete goofs tonight. There were two or three stretches of one or two minutes where the Flyers actually looked like they wanted to play hockey, but aside from that, the team was invisible. Again. To add more sting to tonight’s loss, the Atlanta Thrashers just moved ahead of the Flyers in the Eastern Conference standings. They now have 56 points. Yes, the Thrashers are ahead of the Flyers.
The Flyers had a pretty good hand on this game heading into the third period. They played a solid second period from the 10-minute mark on through the end of it. Dan Carcillo scored on his 25th birthday to make the game 3-1 heading into the third period.
Up to this point, the Flyers kept Ilya Kovalchuk under wraps. Kovalchuk would make it a 1 goal game after a flopped face off sent the puck bouncing right over Matt Carle’s stick and onto his. It was all downhill from there.
The Flyers completely forgot how to play offense after Kovy’s goal and, for the rest of the game, it was all Atlanta.
The Good:
- Claude Giroux had a fantastic game tonight. First, he pulls a sick move and deposit the puck in the back of the net, and then he sets up Arron Asham with a pretty pass that he buried.
- Power play puck movement was better than it has been. Flyers still didn’t score on the power play, but they didn’t have as many opportunities. Atlanta was just up to the task of killing, too.
- Everything but the part of the game where the Flyers didn’t slack………wait…what?
The Bad:
- Ray Emery didn’t look so sharp tonight. He wasn’t single handily at fault for any of the goals, but the ones that did go into the net were very uncharacteristic of him.
- Everything I didn’t mention.
This team is worrying me. 
Awesome delay of game penalty helps lift Penguins over Flyers
Can it really continue to be coincidence that every nationally broadcasted game the Penguins take part in is full of horrible officiating and a two minute surge, that ends up propelling the Penguins over their opponent in the final two minutes of a game? Can it really continue to be a coincidence? Really, it’s growing tiresome. There’s so much to say about today’s officiating, but I’ll get to that later. First, I want to touch on today’s game.
Today’s loss ends the Flyers six game long home winning streak. Complain all you’d like about the officials, because your complaints are legitimate. Just don’t try and tell me they were the complete reason for the outcome of this afternoon’s match-up. The Flyers finished at an abysmal 1 for 9 on the power play. The goal they converted on – Carter’s wrap around luck shot – should have never even gone in. Granted, several of the power plays weren’t full length power plays and were shortened due to another penalty ending, but still, a man advantage is a man advantage.
The turning point of today’s afternoon came when Mike Richards was thought to have given the Flyers a 2-0 lead, instead, Simon Gagne and Evgeni Malkin were tangled up behind the play. Richards scored, but a whistle (that nobody heard) was blown, and although none of the on ice officials had their arms raised, Malkin and Gagne went to the box. However, it was Simon Gagne that was penalized for a phantom high stick that would coincidentally nullify the captain’s goal. On the ensuing power play, Sergei Gonchar took a shot from the point that made its way past a well screened Ray Emery. Just like that, the game was tied. Just like that, a two goal swing completely shifted the momentum of this game into the hands of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Like we’ve never seen this before.
Minutes later, Kimmo Timonen, with one foot still barely in the defensive zone, flipped the puck out of play giving the Penguins another power play. Sergei Gonchar would set up at the top of the zone once again and take a shot. This time, there was more traffic in front of Emery, and Matt Cooke redirected the puck right through Emery’s legs.
Pittsburgh took another penalty with 47 seconds left in the game and gave the Flyers a 6-on-4 opportunity which the Flyers couldn’t capitalize on.
Claude Giroux and Mike Richards decided to try and be entirely too fancy today, and I don’t know why. I’m still confused as to why Darroll Powe was taken off the first line. You can’t have a patient player like Richards and a passer like Giroux on the same line. It’s just not going to click. JVR is clueless and invisible without Giroux. You can tell.
There are several other things that I wanted to get into the recap, but they’ve slipped my mind and I have a miserably painful headache, so I’ll save them for another post. Something’s going to have to carry us into Thursday. That’s when the Flyers play next. Home against the Thrashers.
