A playoff atmosphere at the arena last night and a perfect start before the Flyers found themselves down 4-3. I guess the Flyers should just take the win and move on. Very fitting however, that the line of Leino-Briere-Hartnell plus 4 points from Andrei Meszaros carried the day. Those are the guys that have been there doing it all regular season, and it wasn't Richards or Carter or came through with the big plays when the team needed them today.
So now that the Flyers are in the playoffs, the Flyers have about 4 days to answer some questions.
The issues;
-Zherdev. This one's pretty easy--he stays in the lineup. As long as he's not hurting the team with turnovers or bad penalties or the like, the team could use his stick skills and shooting.
-Briere. Seems to be healthy. Thank god.
-Richards & Carter. No injuries this year, time for Carter to be a go-to scorer in the playoffs. It hasn't been a terribly impressive regular season for Richards, but he should turn it up in the playoffs.
-Pronger. No way to really know what's going on with his injury, but I'd very surprised if he doesn't play in game 1 of the playoffs (with significant minutes).
-Power play. Still looking pretty scattershot.
-Goalies. Alas, the million dollar question, as it has been all season.
So, Goalies
All the indications the past few weeks were that Bobrovsky was Laviolette's guy, and he confirmed as much this week. A while back I decided that my preference was Boucher.
I see Bobrovsky and I see a goalie who hasn't figured it out yet. Regardless of what he is capable of long term, right now I see 3 major holes; 1) gets small and scrunchy on long shots, 2) has developed a disturbing tendency to have a gaping five hole when moving laterally on breakaways, and most importantly, 3) still loses track of the puck often and is caught unaware with traffic and when the puck is jammed in around the crease. The way he was pulled yesterday was very ugly for a goalie who is supposed to carry the load in the playoffs. Honestly, it reminds me of 1997, when in the final game of the season, Hextall was pulled after giving up 4 goals, and the team rallied behind Snow paving the way for Snow in the playoffs.
Given my lack of faith in Bobrovsky, is Boucher any better? Maybe, maybe not. I think if Boucher can stay 'quiet' in the crease, he's the better option. He's not really much more than a mediocre NHL goalie, but he should be mostly reliable.
Honestly I kind of wish Leighton had gotten a game, but I suppose Laviolette was trying to give the keys to his guy, and the Flyers had no breathing room to give Leighton a trial game anyway. Truthfully Leighton is just another not-quite-good-enough goalie on the Flyers payroll, but I do think his play the last few months of last season was better than what Boucher and Bobrovsky are providing right now.
Also, for anyone keeping score, Ray Emery was called up by the Ducks last month and finished the season 7-2 with a 926 save percentage. So much for the Emery as a low-risk high-reward signing, but it's hard to blame the Flyers for not carrying 4 NHL goalies in their ranks.
No matter who's in net, the Flyers inability to lock it down (read, the only NHL team without a shutout this year), is likely going to be their doom this year.
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