Heading into last night's game in Detroit, everything was set up for Philly to lose the game and become the Red Wings' 20th consecutive victim on home ice. That is, in fact, what happened but the way that the Flyers lost the game was galling.
Even when the Flyers grabbed a pair of one-goal leads -- courtesy of a two-goal outburst from Brayden Schenn and a Max Talbot goal -- it felt like Philly was just waiting for disaster around the next bend. They continued to struggle on the penalty kill, made the front of the net an all-too-hospitable place and they got a pedestrian goaltending performance from Sergei Bobrovsky on a night where if he had played even marginally better they may have gotten at least a point from the game. The clutch "momentum" saves just weren't there from Bob on this night.
The third period of the game was very much like Saturday's game. Once the Flyers got scored on early in the third period, their energy level flatlined. I realize that it was the seventh game in 10 days, but the team's performance in the final stanza was feeble.
Detroit has the best record in the NHL for good reason and the Flyers gave them an even match for 40 minutes, but this is a 60-minute (or more) sport. That's pretty much all there is to say, except that the Pittsburgh Penguins have now pulled even with Philly's 69 points and the Flyers are now closer to the eighth-seeded Maple Leafs (62 points) than the first-place New York Rangers (77 points).
The Flyers have three nights off now until playing Buffalo at the Wells Fargo Center on Thursday and the Penguins in another Saturday matinee. You can be sure that there will be a lot of focus on special teams at practice this week because, more than any another single factor (and there have been quite a few factors), poor penalty killing and equally fruitless power plays were key to Philly's losses to the Rangers and Red Wings.
Philly is now 2-4-2 since the All-Star break. Last season, they were 7-3-1 in their first 11 games after the break but then lost their next four in a row.
***********
Courtesy of our sponsor
HockeyTickets.ca, we are happy to announce our next ticket giveaway contest.
This time, we have two free seats for the Flyers-Penguins game on Sat. Feb 18 (1 PM start time) to give away to the winner of a random drawing. Please email your entry to
[email protected] and put "Flyers-Penguins ticket contest" in the subject line.
Deadline for entry is 5 PM EST on Thursday. We will select and contact a winner that evening and announce him or her on Friday's blog.
Also, use coupon code "FlyersBuzz" on Hockeytickets.ca between now and the end of the regular season to receive a 10% discount on all ticket orders over $150 and also have a chance to win two free lower-level seats to a Flyers regular season game of your choice at the Wells Fargo Center.
Thank you as always for your support and special thanks once again to HockeyBuzz's Steven Hindle for securing the tickets for us.
KINDLE USERS: Please sign up for Flyers Buzz. For more information click here.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
Join the Discussion:
»