The Phoenix Coyotes finished up the first half of the 2013-14 season with a loss at home to the Philadelphia Flyers by a score of 5-3 on Saturday night.
After getting a point in six straight games (2-0-4), the Coyotes have lost two straight to open the New Year. They don’t play again until Tuesday when they take on the Calgary Flames in what is the fourth game of a six game home-stand.
The loss against was not as bad as the 5-3 score indicates, as the final Flyers goal was scored into an empty net. It was, however, a game that the Coyotes could easily have won had they not blown a two goal second period lead. This is disconcerting because the Coyotes are supposed to be a team that makes up for their lack of scoring with solid defense and excellent goaltending. That being said, it’s hard to get indignant about a game that was way more entertaining than usual – not to say the Coyotes are a boring team, but they rarely fight and the majority of their games are very low scoring. Saturday’s match featured eight goals and one of the best fights you are likely to see.
http://www.hockeyfights.com/fights/121238
The fight, featuring Bissonnette vs. Jay Rosehill, was absolutely great. I would say it was a draw with a possible slight edge to Rosehill, but Bissonnette is giving up quite a bit of size here and he acquits himself well. This fight was almost like two fights in one, as the two combatants paused halfway to remove their elbow pads. Best fight of the year so far, in my opinion. This is, I think, only the eighth fight of the season for the Coyotes and I for one would like to see them fight more – it’s important for a team whose identity is wrapped around its tight defense to be tough and hard to play against.
Besides the fight, the game saw the return of Shane Doan from a mysterious blood disease that kept him out of the lineup for the last twelve games. Doan was his usual effective, scrappy self in playing almost nineteen minutes of ice time. Though he didn’t have a shot or point, I think everyone who watches and cares about the Coyotes knows that he brings a lot more than just offense to the team. Nice to see Doan make a full recovery and the Coyotes are sure to be a better team with him in the lineup – if for no other reason than it lets Tippet play guys like Moss, Klinkhammer and Kennedy farther down in the lineup, where they can be more effective.
Of course, as seems to be the way this season is going – they win one, lose one, as their basically .500 record will attest to – Doan’s return was overshadowed by the loss of Oliver Ekman-Larsson, who was hit from behind by Columbus’ Derek MacKenzie on Thursday. MacKenzie received the requisite three game suspension from the NHL and of course, nothing will change as regards to players trying to kill each other.
The NHL and their teams maintain their anti-fan-friendly approach to injury disclosure and OEL is “day-to-day… with an “upper body… injury. My opinion is that he probably has a concussion since it seemed like he hit his head on the glass when he was hit, but who knows? He got up immediately and they said after that it was precautionary that he didn’t return that night. Coupled with the fact that he was a “game time decision… last night, it doesn’t look like he will be out long. Still, I for one wish the NHL would force its teams to be a little more forthright in revealing their player’s injuries. I mean, the argument seems to be that other teams could exploit this knowledge, but that is ridiculous since anyone watching can see what part of the player is injured and if the opposing team wants to exploit an injury, they aren’t going to be fooled by calling it upper or lower body. The only ones who lose here are fans who just want to know when their favorite players will be back.
Anyways, if you missed the game and want a full re-cap, Flyer’s Blogger Bill Meltzer has a very good one up in his current blog on this site and I thought reposting the same thing would be a little redundant and instead will just offer up a few random thoughts on the game.
- Rundblad was sat again after returning to the lineup Thursday against Columbus. He looked OK to me that game, playing a ton once OEL went down. I don’t pretend to know what’s going on internally with the team, or to know better than the coach, but how is a guy supposed to get in a rhythm and play well if you sit him immediately after playing him for the first time in almost a month? With OEL sidelined, you would think Rundblad’s offense would be something they want to get into the lineup.
- Boedker seems to get more dangerous by the game and his breakaway goal against the Flyers last night was a thing of beauty. I can’t wait to see what he does once he starts being surrounded by quality offensive line mates.
- Smith wasn’t terrible, but he wasn’t great either. The Coyotes rarely score, so he has to be great if they are going to do anything this year and he really hasn’t been in a while. At least two of the goals last night were stoppable. Not that they were brutal or anything, but when Smith’s at the top of his game he stops them.
- I don’t know why Tippet didn’t pull his goalie earlier, as the Coyotes had a power player with under two minutes left and could have had a six on four.
-Scary moment in the first as Hartnell’s skate hit Klinkhammer in the helmet. Luckily he was fine, but it is crazy when skates go up in the air like that.
- Yandle continues to play great even though he was snubbed by Team USA. He played five minutes more than anyone else and was dangerous all night. He also broke up several scoring chances and was as effective in his own end as anyone else on the team. He did, however, get caught trying to skate the puck out of his own end, which led to the winning goal. Though, to blame him there would be unfair – he had done the same thing about three other times and it was working. Tough to hang the horns on him for that goal after he played so well, but he might want to limit how often he tries that (though I doubt he would care to take coaching advice from me).
Tune in tomorrow when we will discuss the Coyote’s first half of the season in more detail. As always, Thanks for Reading.
P.S I have joined the 21st Century and opened up a Twitter account. It’s JamesTanner@Coyotes1234 or maybe just Coyotes1234 - either way, look for me to be dropping some Coyotes related Tweets in the future.