The Flyers got thumped by the Sabres in game two of the playoff series 8-2. The Sabres scored 5 goals on 10 shots in the first period. This led to Robert Esche being pulled after the first and Antero Niittymaki playing the rest of the game. Although Robert Esche was for the most part stellar in game one stopping 55 of 58 shots, he couldn’t get it going in game 2. To be honest most of those goals you really can’t pin on Esche. Defensive break downs in front of him led to the scoring chances, whether it is Desjardins trying to pinch, Rathje not covering his man on the power play or Pitkanen being out of position leading to another odd man rush. It was not just them, the entire team play very poor defensively.
Hitchcock talks about playing good positional hockey which can offset the Sabres speed and I believe it can. However the pace the Flyers play at needs to pick up. When the Flyers have the puck they need to move it more quickly and when they don’t have the puck they need to pressure the puck along with the defense being more aware of the Sabres forwards. The Flyers don’t have to try to match the Sabres skating speed, but they do need to make decisions quicker and respond quicker to things happening on the ice. For some including Philly media who view the Flyers as the glass half empty, their predictions so far have unfortunately turned out to be true.
Scoring for the Flyers were Simon Gagne a minute into the 2nd period and Petr Nedved about 6 minutes into the third. The Flyers managed 22 shots on goal, 8 in the first, 4 in the second and 10 in the third.
For the Sabres Jea-Pierre Dumont and Jason Pominville both picked up hat tricks. Chris Drury and Ales Kotalik also scored.
Robert Esche game up 5 goals on 10 shots. Antero Niittymaki gave up 3 goals on 18 shots in the 2nd and 3rd period.
Chants of USA went up during the first period from Buffalo fans. For those that don’t know. Robert Esche was picked as one of the goalies for Team USA in this past Olympics over Ryan Miller. The picks were made early in the season at the time Miller was really an unknown at least on the NHL level outside of Buffalo. But as the season progressed Miller’ stats were stronger than Esche’s and probably the other two goalies picked. So Buffalo fans thought he should have been picked decided to make themselves known with the USA chant. I agree with the TSN commentators that the fans weren’t showing much class with the chant. However this is playoff hockey and anything fans can say/yell/chant that gets the other team off their game is fair game. It just shows the Sabres fans don’t forget. In other news Brett Hull has announced that he is coming out of retirement to play for the Flyers for the rest of this series. But seriously, this game wasn’t about goalies. If one could pickup and swap the two goalies, putting Miller in the Flyers net and Esche in the Sabres, the results would have been about the same.
Although Robert Esche only played a period he did get some Hextall type action in. While skating toward the bench for a Sabres penalty call Esche went after Derek Roy for going after Forsberg which to be honest was quite funny. I always enjoy a goalie mucking it up.
R.J. Umberger who was expected to play was scratched since he didn’t pass his baseline test. In the beginning of each season each player has basically head tests done to create their baseline. So when they get wacked in the head the trainers can run tests to see how the hit to the head has affected them. Umberger failed the memory portion of the test. He will be retested before the next game. Branko Radivojevic got the start replacing him. Ben Eager also got some playing with Donald Brashear a healthy scratch. Eager had 6 minutes of icetime picking up 2 roughing, 1 tripping and 2 10 minute misconduct penalties. Even with Eagers penalties I like his speed and offensive skills over Brashear.
Flyers coach Ken Hitchcock and Sabres coach Lindy Ruff got into a little war of worlds.
Lindy Ruff – “The more they acted like idiots, the more we wanted to play.”
Ken Hitchcock – “That’s Lindy’s opinion. I’ve seen his teams do the same thing. He ought to not talk about that. . . . Tell Lindy to (expletive deleted) off. Mind his own (expletive deleted) business.”
That’s good stuff, all the emotional stuff of playoff hockey. Although quotes today from both of them backing off their comments.
Hitchcock is taking the blame for the game. “Look, it’s my responsibility to get the team ready, OK? This is on me. We were embarrassed for our fans and for the city of Philadelphia with the way we played. We’ve got to make amends when we go back home and get this series back even. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”
As much as there was as a Flyer fan to complain about I also have to bitch about TSN and a lesser extent about NHL Center Ice. As I have mentioned before I have NHL Center Ice. This gives me access to all the games that are not nationally broadcasted games in the US. Center Ice picks a feed, how they decide which one, I don’t know. But last night’s game they went with TSN. Besides having to watch Canadian commercials this is really not a big deal, until last night. The Sabres were up 5-0 at the end of the first period. I am sure many fair weather fans, like Shawn decided just to turn it off. But a fan like myself although irritated at the Flyers for their play was still very interested in the game. Several minutes into the second period TSN decided that since the game was a blowout at that point they were going to cut to another game, which they did. TSN stopped showing the Flyers game and started showing the OLN feed, the Rangers vs Devils. As much as this pissed me off, this had to piss off Buffalo fans watching TSN even more. TSN did come back to the game late in the second period when the game started to get ‘chippy’ as they say, only to breakaway again during intermission. Thanks a lot TSN for showing less than half the game you were scheduled to broadcast. Center Ice apparently asleep at the wheel took them quite a while to switch to another feed, MSG with about 6 minutes remaining in the game. Thanks for the effort TSN!
Nedved scored 9 seconds after Gagne had a goal disallowed when a video review showed the net had been dislodged, which I really can’t talk about since the game wasn’t important enough for TSN to finish showing. Also missed Eagers first 10 minute misconduct and some of the ‘chippy’ play.