Flyers Down…..But Not Out- Sports Talk With the Straight Shuter

Flyers Down…..But Not Out- Sports Talk With the Straight Shuter

by Jesse Shuter

Staff Writer

Photo courtest of http://www.greatermediaphiladelphia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/975-the-fanatic-home-of-the-flyers-1170×600-1170×450.jpg

The Philadelphia Flyers have been battling the New York Rangers in the playoffs for a total of five games now in the first round of the 2014 NHL Playoffs. After the game sunday, the Rangers lead the series 3-2. That means that the Flyers will be once again trying to tie the series at home on tuesday the 29th of April.

The Flyers are in a bad situation because, had they won on sunday, they could win the series at home. Now the best case scenario is that they win at home on tuesday. Then they would have to win in New York, which they have only done once in the last eleven attempts, for them to win the series.

The Flyers biggest issues in the past, have been defense and goaltending. The interesting thing is that these are not their problems this time around. In fact one could argue that there goalie and defense situation is as good as it has been all season long. The issue is their offense. The Flyers get a lot of scoring chances that they fail to convert on. Some chances are even easy shots that players should be able to make, and stupid mistakes cost them the goal, and therefore them game.

Recently, many people have said that thing that the flyers are lacking is another all star forward. Many teams have there one-two punch of two incredible players that make their teams phenomenal. The Pittsburgh Penguins, for example, have Sidney Crosby (booooo) and Evgeni Malkin (booooo). The Chicago Blackhawks have Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews. The Flyers have Claude Giroux and………..who else?

With forwards like Brayden Schenn, Sean Couturier, Jakub Voracek, Scott Hartnell, Wayne Simmonds, Vincent Lecavlier, etc. the Flyer have a pretty stacked core of forwards. But I agree that they need there star. The Flyer like to pass the puck. They like to pass the puck a lot, and sometimes that’s great, it sets them up for a goal. Other times, they pass and pass and no one scores and they lose. If they had an Alex Ovechkin, or Steve Stamkos, someone that they can get the puck to and trust them to fire the shot for a goal. That would be a Stanley Cup championship team. So now I have good news and bad news for Flyers fans. Bad news first, I don’t see a Steve Stamkos in our immediate future. The good news, the Flyers are still a Stanley Cup Caliber team without one.

Anyone that watches the Flyers will agree with me that lately the Flyers have been playing there best when they are down. That’s great, that means I am very confident we can win at home one tuesday. The Flyers then need to figure out how to translate that fighting power they get when they are desperate to a game where they are not in fact desperate for points. If they can do that, they can win it all.