Flyers Come Back Big; Other Flyers Happenings

The Flyers have not come back from a 2 goal or more deficit all season, that is until tonight when the Flyers were down 2-0 against the New Jersey Devils late in the 2nd. A great breakout by Claude Giroux to James Van Riemsdyk led to the Flyers first goal, and with a little more than a minute later they would tie it up on another nice breakout. This time, it was Scott Hartnell feeding Jeff Carter across the slot to ram it home past Brodeur to close out the 2nd period tied at two. It would stay that way until Kimmo Timonen made a nice pinch into the offensive zone on the powerplay and brought the puck behind the net before finding his captain in front of the net for an easy slam dunk into the net to take the lead 3-2. These three goal scorers have been struggling lately and maybe they pick it up after some confidence-boosting goals tonight.

Flyers Trade OKT and 2011 5th Rounder for Ville Leino

The Flyers and Red Wings have inked a deal this morning to move one of this year’s new Flyers, Ole-Kristian Tollefsen, to Detroit along with a 5th round pick in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft for forward Ville Leino. This move was probably in conjunction with getting rid of Tollefsen who became dead weight after we signed Krajicek. The question is, where will Leino play? I see him playing for Adirondack and maybe getting a shot sometime down the road. This was more of a depth move for forward since we have a good amount at defense once Parent and Syvret get healthy.

Don’t know too much about this Leino fellow but hopefully he pans out somehow.

Devils Get Kovalchuk

Reports are running rampant that Kovalchuk will be in the Atlantic Division, but on the Flyers. The Devils and Thrashers have not announced details, but sources say that it is a done deal. Don’t have to worry about signing him now, but he will be a threat the rest of the season and we see the Devils for two games next week. It certainly makes things interesting.

Oilers Steal One Late; Emery Extention Looming?

Last night’s game was in no way a poor showing by the Flyers. They did another good job of keeping the puck away from Michael Leighton who got his first start in a while last night. They mustered 33 shots on goal while keeping the Oilers to 27, and it was their last shot that counted. Darroll Powe was fighting with an Oiler forward for the puck in the defensive zone, and one too many stick lifts led to an Oilers powerplay with less than 2 minutes in regulation. With less than 17 seconds left on the Oilers’ last rush, former Flyer Ryan Potulny slid a puck past Leighton on an east-to-west pass play by Gagner. That one play proved to be fatal, as the Flyers had trouble finding the back of the net even with 11 shots on the powerplay. There were many chances that were inches from going in, including quite a few shots off the post and lots of traffic in front causing loose pucks to either go wide or get deflected/blocked away. It was just one of those nights for the Flyers and the Oilers won consecutive games for the first time since Gretzky played for them (just kidding, but really it was a long drought for them).

They need to move on and play at Minnesota Saturday night to come home for two home and home series with the Devils and Canadiens before the break. Not much else to be said about the Oilers game, they just need to get points before the break. Out of 10 points available left to get, I’d accept 8 at the least.

The Ilya Kovalchuk Sweepstakes

Jeff Carter would be gone. That’s one of the only scenario that I could see happening. He is the only top forward on our team that holds interest from other NHL clubs that does not have a no-trade clause. Would you be willing to part with his goal scoring ability and defensive play? I’m not, and I don’t see Holmgren willing to either. However, since the Flyers are one of the teams heavily invested in talks with the Thrashers, this debate becomes a news story.

Even if we could get someone to waive their no-trade clause (Gagne or Briere) they would not be interested in moving to Atlanta, that’s for sure. Leave a Cup contending team with a loyal fan base to a building franchise like Atlanta? Gagne has been here his whole career, and shows no sign or want to leave Philly. Briere is getting paid out the ass right now and has yet to have as good of a season as his first one with the Flyers during their ECF run in the 07-08 season. Of course, he has been plagued with injuries but that doesn’t change the fact that he has not been producing as much as he did in Buffalo or when he first came here. Obviously, Richards will not be traded and would not be needed to waive his NTC as he is the face and captain of our franchise for the next decade. What are our other options?

Richie Passes Century Goal Mark, Flyers Start Trip On Right Foot

March 5th 2009: The day after the trade deadline where Scottie Upshall was sent packing to Phoenix and Daniel Carcillo played his first game as a Flyer. The Flyers hosted the Calgary Flames that night, a team with a huge spark with new deadline-addition Olli Jokinen. The Flyers got smoked that night in front of their home crowd 5-1, and all fingers pointed to the lack of emotion and jump in their game due to the loss of teammate Scottie Upshall. Almost a year later, the Flames hosted the Flyers the day after they themselves were involved in an important trade. It was apparently time for a little revenge.

Homestand Ends with 8 Points Out of 12; The No-Goal Trend and New D-Man

The Flyers finished their homestand 4-2, with the two losses coming at the end of each game in disappointing fashion. They finished off the Islanders on Saturday in what was a pretty tight game. Now they go on a 3 game road trip through Calgary, Edmonton, and Minnesota before coming back home for those New Jersey Devils.

A successful homestand through and through, but it would have been nice to come away with the other points. It could have easily been a 6-0 homestand and we could be sitting pretty in the standings, but instead we’re still tightened up at the 6th seed. They have to take it to two Canadian teams this week who haven’t been able to make a lot of good things happen and have been losing a lot lately. However that may make them more dangerous than they appear and they can’t afford to lose any points, even if it is out of conference.

It’d be nice to see the Flyers win these next couple games as usual, especially with the growing trend of disallowing Flyers’ goals. Gagne at Pittsburgh earlier this month, Richards against Pittsburgh last Saturday, and Timmonen on the power play yesterday against the Islanders. The Gagne and Timmonen goals were actual goals, no argument about it. Hartnell hit Roloson after the puck went in, so it should be a goal. Richards’ goal was a shaky incident and the phantom high-sticking call on Gagne never happened. Malkin elbows Gags in the head, and they come together and start jawing. No high stick. I’m not saying the whole league is out to get us, but god damn it sure as hell fuels the fire for those conspiracy theorists who are into that kind of stuff.

New D-Man
The Flyers have signed Lukas Krajicek, a 6-3, 205-pound defenseman who was released by the Lightning this past week. This is to add depth after the injuries to Syvret and Parent and the lackluster play by OKT as of late. Maybe the change of scenery can help a young guy like Krajicek play better, but I see this as more of a cheap option for now to see how it pans out as the trade deadline draws closer. If it doesn’t I fully expect some sort of trade to happen by then for our defense.

Thrashers Come to Town Tonight

Ilya Kovalchuk and those 11th place (not by much) Atlanta Thrashers will be at the Wach tonight. Most of the news surrounding this team lately deals with the trade talk and where Kovalchuk might go considering he’s on the last year of his contract. The Flyers are one of the teams approached by Atlanta’s management about the trade, but it is highly unlikely due to our lack of prospects and players that we would be able/willing to give up.

Flyers Odds and Ends Following Sunday’s Loss

Sunday’s outcome was a tough pill to swallow. I feel that the Penguins stole that game in those last few minutes after a very unlucky bounce of the puck out of play by Timmonen. The Flyers played a great game, and I’m still bitter about some of those calls (the one disallowing that 2nd goal especially, as well as the Hartnell interference call). There’s nothing they can do about it now, except get ready for Atlanta on Thursday.

Flyers OnTheFly has reported that they will be off today after having a special teams-oriented practice yesterday. Another encouraging tidbit from the Flyers is that defenseman underwent successful surgery to remove a disc fragment in his lumbar spine. From a health standpoint, this is great news because anything to do with the spine is obviously serious business. He is slated to return anywhere after the next 6 weeks, and us Flyers fans wish him a speedy recovery. OKT has not necessarily been terrible, but he still has not has not played as well as he did before he re-injured his knee. He had some decent games back in October and November. Hopefully he gets back on track. I still like the way Bartulis has been playing, and I’d like to see his continued play with Timmonen. He could learn a lot from Kimmo.

The internet buzz this past weekend has still been on the whole Carcillo and Gaborik fight that happened last Thursday. My opinion is no different than that of other reasonable opinions; Gaborik dropped his gloves, and thus loses all “honorable protection” or however Tortorella wants to put a spin on it. Carcillo picked him off of the pile up, and did not punch him. They jawed a bit, exchanged some shoves, then when the gloves come off, Carcillo sees an oppurtunity to take their leading scorer off the ice for 5 minutes and get a few shots in. Would they be saying the same thing if Avery went after Richards or Carter? It’s not even like Carcillo is a big guy either. He is a lightweight, maybe even a small middleweight by hockey fighter standards. I feel like every Rangers-Flyers broadcast I see, Torts is blowing his cap off about something or another. Avery went after Richards in the last 7 seconds of an already decided game. Was Lavvy attacking Avery in the media? No. It’s even funnier that all the Rangers who were asked about the Gaborik incident had something bad to say about Carcillo too. Of course they’re going to side with their player, but maybe Gaborik should think before he acts last time. That’s all I’m going to say about it. The topic is almost a week old and is tired already.

I’m still really excited about Giroux centering JVR and Asham. I feel like Asham is an under-appreciated part of the Flyers team. Powe and Betts are starting to get some more recognition due to their defensive play and great fore-checking along with the Flyers record with and without them in the line-up. Asham, however, seems to have a bag of tricks he pulls out at certain times. Small as that bag is, he has impressed me the past season and a half in Flyers orange, and it’s not often that happens coming from someone who played for a rival (Devils) a season earlier. I like Asham’s strong play along the boards and how he uses his body to protect the puck, allowing JVR to use his long reach and big body to help him dig pucks and get them to the points to set up in the zone. There’s not enough things to say about Giroux and how calm and confident he is with the puck. Not many young players like that can maneuver like he can, and all eyes are on him when he gets steam going through the offensive zone. If they can continue to get scoring chances like that, not many 3rd lines on other teams will be able to fully match-up with us. And then they know what comes with our tenacious 4th line.

Until Thursday, Go Flyers.

Flyers Keep the Ball Rolling

The Flyers are 3-0 so far in their home stand as of today, because they won a tough game against the Hurricanes. Although they didn’t play as dominant as they did the previous one against the Rangers, a win is a win, and two points are two points. They came our revving and the 4th line continues to “wow” people as Carcillo continues to show that the Upshall trade was not exactly what we thought it was. I know Scottie was a fan favorite here, but in all honesty, Carcillo is one of the players who has benefited most from the coaching change. Lav’s style is favorable to players like him and Darroll Powe. Powe is playing at a high level right now with two of our best forwards, and Carcillo continues to get better with two veterans who are helping him out. His discipline has been much better as of late and he has not taken as many stupid penalties since Laviolette has taken over. Carter and Pronger both scored to win the game, while Carter notched another one with an empy-netter with less than a second left.