The Philadelphia Flyers were shutout 5-0 by the Canadiens last night in Montreal. Michael Ryder scored a hat trick for the Canadiens becoming the third player in six games to do so against the Flyers. Only saw one hat on the ice for Ryder, what’s the deal with that?
The Flyers gave up 2 power play goals on 6 chances and went 0 for 5 on their power play chances. Flyers have gone 5 straight games without a power play goal.
Flyers also lost another player to injury, Mike Rathje left in the second period with a groin injury.
Sami Kapanen who last week was made a permanent Alternate Captain had this to say. “We keep talking about playing a good game and following up with another good game and obviously we didn’t do it once again today. It’s getting to the point [where] it’s ridiculous. When the other team is smiling and laughing skating up the ice, at least punish those guys. I don’t care what we do we just have to fight a little harder. It’s frustrating right now.”
This is the problem with the Flyers right now. There is no passion, no energy. Aren’t they supposed to get a little pissed off when getting outplayed so badly? They have been shut out twice, badly in the past five games. They should be pissed at themselves for sucking so bad and pissed at the opposing team. Late in the game when the Flyers are down 4 or 5 goals in the third period, the game should be ‘tense’. I’m not calling for anyone to take off anyone’s head, or break anyone’s ankle, but the Flyers need to do something else besides having meetings, holding hands and talking about what is wrong.
Three stars for the game were Michael Ryer, Cristobal Huet and Michael Komisarek.
Throughout this slump the Flyers have been going thru in January the goal tending has been between decent and great. Antero Niittymaki last night was really good thru the first two periods. The first couple goals by Montreal were unstoppable, but when the Flyers don’t score it doesn’t matter how well the goaltending is.
It can be hard to be so critical of the team with the ridiculous amount of injuries the Flyers have had to deal with, sometimes I just feel sorry for them.
But the problem with the team is the lack of energy. They are just not playing with any passion. If the Flyers would play high energy high passion games and still lose, then yes the 260+ missed man games would be to blame. Thankfully there are only three games left before the Olympics break.