9-8

It was a remarkable game.  17 goals, 3 goalie changes, each team with a 5 goal run.  Highlights:



As remarkable as it was though, it defies most comment.  The Flyers deserve heavy criticism for the way they rapidly turned a 1-0 lead into a 5-1 hole, but pretty much from that point it was pandemonium out there.  Fundamentals and discipline went out the window and there's no much reason to dwell on what happened in the 2nd and 3rd period.

The bigger story is Bryzgalov's post game comments:



The conventional wisdom is that you never want to hear any player, let alone the goalie who teammates must trust, to say he has no confidence in himself.  The "correct" answer he was supposed to give is that he was embarrassed by his play, but will work hard to figure things and be better the next game.


Apparently that's not Bryzgalov's way.  It's been a really bad week for him, and this game is the new low.  I wouldn't get caught up on what he says; he's pretty aloof and will deal with it in his own way.  It WILL be a problem if his play doesn't start to improve though.  He can say what he want as long as his play improves, but if his play continues to decline people will jump on these comments and say his attitude is hurting him.

The good news that can be taken away from last night's game is that they had two effective lines.  Hartnell has Giroux and Jagr creating more 5-on-5 pressure, and JVR on the wing made Briere look much more dangerous.

The bad news is that for the second consecutive game the Flyers took a 1-0 lead, then capitulated. 

With all the new faces on the team an adjustment period should've been expected.  The preseason and first few games went so well, however, that expectations for this team rapidly changed.  5-4-1 in October for a team with so much turnover is not such a bad thing, but the team needs to get straightened out quick before 5-4 becomes 5-10, which would be a very bad thing.