The Flyers currently are tied for second place in the league in points with 16 to the Montreal Canadiens and the Boston Bruins alike. This young Flyers team has been beaten and battered with losing the likes of Sean Couturier, Morgan Frost, and Philippe Myers for a period of time in the early going.
Let’s start with some great news first as the Flyers are having no trouble scoring goals. They have tallied 38 goals for a +3 goal differential in 11 games played. With the good news, of course, there are some bad news. The Flyers are having trouble with puck management, and this is forcing some ill advised turnovers. Moreover, the Flyers are also allowing too many shots per game at a clip of 33.8 shots per game. These bad habits have to be cured sooner rather than later for this team to be considered a Cup contender.
The Flyers appeared to play their best game overall at even strength. They weren’t rushing plays, and trying to thread the needle with perfect passes. The orange and black appeared to simplify their game using tough forechecking, and winning puck battles. Everything went their way 5-on-5, but the Penalty Kill was a let down, as the Flyers surrendered three Power Play goals, “I thought he did well,” Head Coach Alain Vigneault said following the 4-3 overtime loss, “We got a little bit unlucky there on that one. Ghost got beat one-on-one by obviously a good player. We sort of tapped that one in our net. Provy tried to take that pass. They got a bounce there. They won a one-on-one on the rush. They earned that. We’re right there. We battled hard. We had a 3-1 lead. I liked the way we played on 5-on-5. Obviously tonight our penalty kill didn’t do the job.”
Unfortunately, the Penalty Kill which was red-hot killing off the last 11 power play opportunities heading into the Boston Bruins contest this past Wednesday, has been a let down. The Flyers now own the fourth worst PK in the league with a 70.7% success rate. They have allowed 12 goals on 47 chances while short-handed. Again some factors that contribute to this are the loss of Sean Couturier, and being hemmed in the zone. The Flyers have had trouble clearing the zone, while having clean zone exits, “It wouldn’t matter who we would be playing the next game,” Vigneault said, “It’s a tough loss. We had a lead against a real good team and we permitted their power play to give them an opportunity to win the game, which they did. You got no time to feel sorry for yourself. You got to get right back at it. That’s what we’re going to do.”
One area of improvement that the Flyers must improve upon tonight to the red-hot Boston Bruins is stop taking bad penalties. Penalties, such as, the interference penalty to Scott Laughton that cost the Flyers the game on Wednesday night. One can make a case for a bad penalty to Kevin Hayes, but it was a bit ticky-tacky, so I’m giving the benefit of the doubt here. Regardless, the Flyers penalty allowed three goals against on four chances. That is not a recipe for success, just stay out of the box.
The faster this bad habit is cured, the faster this team can prove to the world that they could beat a good Boston team. Until this time, people throughout the world will continue to doubt whether this year’s Flyers team is better than last year’s.
