The Flyers took yet another brutal beating on Saturday night- this time from the Boston Bruins- in the form of a resounding 6-1 loss. The Flyers’ players, coaches and fans are beginning to get rather irritated with their play: I even saw some tweets from fans suggesting that Carter Hart should go back to the Phantoms or get traded. This, my friends, is just absurd! This obvious frustration is ill-guided and misinformed. Sure, Carter Hart’s play to date has not been his best, that is easy to see. With a current goals-against-average of 4.18 and a save percentage of .880 someone not knowing too much about the Flyers might say that just that. But the finger pointing should start with lot of other people before it lands in the direction of Hart- that’s for sure.
The most noticeable problem is the team’s health: Both defenseman Philippe Myers and Selke Trophy award winning center Sean Couturier are absent due to some fairly severe injuries that occurred earlier in the season. With these two defensive catalysts out of the lineup the Flyers were then forced to have to rely on what was left- the Flyers’ star defender Ivan Provorov (who has tried to carry the extra weight by averaging a career high 25:16 minutes a night this season) looks to be exhausted and stretched too thin, as he has begun to make some easy mistakes. These injuries caused other mistakes made by the team’s general manager to be drawn to the forefront as well.
For example: Re-signing Justin Braun. The decision to bring him back -in this writers’ mind, at least- seems to be more and more like a panic move by the Flyers’ general manager Chuck Fletcher who announced this re-signing mere hours after Matt Niskanen’s decision to retire early was made public. Since coming back, Braun has been asked to play on both the team’s top defensive pairing and then their second defensive pairing- when the previously mentioned did not go well. Instead, they should be playing him on the 3rd pairing, in a role he is now best suited for at this point in his career.
Newly acquired Flyers defenseman Erik Gustafsson’s play while on the power play has looked great but it is his total lack of defensive ability that has most Flyers fans begging for Shayne Gostisbehere to come back. That’s a sad state of affairs, considering that Shayne sat out most of last season due to the fact that he was playing very similar to the way Gustafsson is now- with many plays resulting in costly turnovers in his own zone and a lack of good, defensive decision making which resulted in an onslaught of goals in the back of Hart’s net.
Defenseman Travis Sanheim has been playing well until he was asked to line up on the team’s top defensive pairing across from Provorov. This is a position that not only had Sanheim playing above his skill set but sees also him at a physical disadvantage playing as a left-hand shot playing on the wrong side of the ice.
Perhaps this loss to the Bruins may not have been so upsetting if it was not for the fact that the Boston Bruins are not the same President’s Trophy winning team that they were last year. Throughout the ‘20-‘21 season, the Bruins have been without last year’s NHL leading goal scorer David Pastrnak (who is out due to a hip surgery) and have since lost both of their top defensemen from last season as well. That’s right: The Bruins’ long-time captain Zdeno Chara is no longer in Boston; Rather, he chose to sign with the Washington Capitals this season. Then, the other loss to the Boston blueline was Torey Krug’s departure for St. Louis via free agency. With that being said, the Flyers have yet to face the best the east has to offer, and they are already finding themselves handed some pretty substantial losses. This may be reason to panic.
Now to break down the defensive breakdown on Saturday night. To keep this short and sweet: The Flyers are taking far too many costly penalties! Lets review the goals that the Flyers let in.
–The first goal that was scored was allowed during the man advantage (while the Flyers were on the penalty kill).
–The second goal was netted by Boston’s new winger Craig Smith who scored when he was doing what he does best- crashing the net and putting a nice juicy rebound in the back of it.
–The third goal against the Flyers happened when the Flyers again were careless with the puck. Defenseman Robert Hagg chased a Bruin all the way up to the blueline after a turnover in the neutral zone because the team’s wingers were cherry picking before the Flyers fully cleared the zone with the puck. This press by Hagg lead to Gustafsson making a poor defensive decision and abandoning the front of the net in order to pursue the Bruins’ rookie Trent Frederic while he was skating against the glass along the side boards. While this was going on, Boston’s Charlie Coyle beat out a back-checking Jakub Voracek to redirect a pass sent by Frederic over Hart. (You read that right folks) Voracek may have been beat for a goal on this play, but my has it been nice to see him finally buy into his coach’s system.
–The fourth goal was scored by yet another Flyers turnover that led to a quick pass that was misplayed by Gustafsson and ended up being deflected off his shin pad and landed right on the stick of an awaiting Patrice Bergeron, who then was able to make a beautiful pass to none other than the rat Brad Marchand. Marchand, while still in motion, was then able to put the puck in the back of the net.
–The fifth goal by the Bruins was the direct result of yet another Flyers costly penalty that the Bruins were able to capitalize on while on the power play.
–The sixth and final goal of this contest- you guessed it- happened while the Flyers found themselves on yet another penalty kill.
To sum up: Saying that this is all Carter Hart’s fault is preposterous! The Flyers play as a whole has to tighten up. They have given up far too many costly turnovers this season and they have taken far too many unnecessary penalties! With this many mistakes I do not care if everyone was healthy, Philadelphia would still be losing games! With a few exceptions, the Flyers have forgotten how to play Vigneault’s style of game, which requires his players to have a defensively-sound game first before they even think about going on the offensive side of the ice. Carter Hart’s focus and confidence has obviously been rattled and will require his team to step up and help him out. He and Brain Elliott have been asked to do far too much already in this shortened season to help their team. Without the solid play of these two in most games this season the team’s record would be far worse than it already is. With that being said, we will have to see if the boss behind the bench can right these wrongs this season and return his team to the winners they were during the opening series against their most hated rival: The Pittsburgh Penguins. There’s also no time like the present to gain a little confidence back, with the team set to take a short road trip up the turnpike to visit last year’s bottom dwellers: the New Jersey Devils. Don’t give up on this team yet, Flyers fans; This shortened season is still young.
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