The Flyers went undefeated in the round robin portion of this year’s playoffs; advancing themselves to be seated as the first place team in the Eastern Conference after beating “the best” their Conference had to offer. However, this victory did not come without a loss though. In the 4-1 victory over the Boston Bruins on Sunday August 2nd, 2020. Left-Wing Michael Raffl went awkwardly into the boards in the third period, and was apparently slew-footed from behind by Jeremy Lauzon of the Bruins. Raffl who was having an amazing game up to that point with a goal and assist had to be assisted off the ice by fellow teammate Scott Laughton and Flyers Athletic Trainer Jim McCrossin. Raffl needed the assistance of these men after such a dirty play left him unable to sustain any pressure on his foot.
Sure, Nate Thompson comes in as Raffl is still rolling around on the ice in pain and checks Lauzon, but the minute Lauzon shoves Thompson back and looks to ready himself for a bout Thompson just backs away awkwardly. I’m sorry but isn’t this why the Flyers traded for Nate Thompson at the deadline? As we are slowly but surely finding out the Flyers are being outmatched physically against the Montreal Canadiens. Now the Flyers may get away with it this round, but how about as they get deeper into the playoffs against teams like the New York Islanders, Boston Bruins or Tampa Bay Lightning. For instance check out this sequence below as Joel Armia hits Nate Thompson, thus forcing a brutal turnover into a beautiful pass from Jonathan Drouin to the tape of Nick Suzuki for a tap in goal:
The Flyers were outhit and outmuscled for the most part in Game 5, as the Canadiens outhit the Flyers 39-28. They won the puck battles along the boards, and just played a well orchestrated physical game. I wrote an article a week and a half ago on the lack of physicality the Flyers have, and got ripped by some fans before the Canadiens series started.
Now I am not saying that the team needs to change what has been obviously working up to this point, and begin to play an undisciplined style of hockey (going full Hanson Brother’s SLAPSHOT) in future games. However, I do know that their lack of standing up for one another and settling for just getting up in a guy’s face after a dirty play and telling him “hey that was not very nice”, ISN’T GOING TO CUT IT!!! In a grueling seven game series (which the Flyers look set to have a multitude of in the coming weeks ahead) opposing teams are going to get frustrated when they begin to go down in the series. With desperation setting in teams usually begin to play less and less disciplined. Which tends to result in injuries to whomever they are playing at the current time.
With the Flyers dominating in the Round Robin portion of this year’s playoffs, and have played a solid series against the Canadiens thus far. You can bet that they have opened some eyes around the NHL, and have gained the respect they so deserve from the majority of teams left in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. That is for what they’ve shown they can produce on the scoreboard, but if they don’t start to put an undying fear of retaliation into their adversaries when they do wrong you can expect to see the Flyers injury list start to multiply as the playoffs proceed.
