Despite the disappointment in the final score of yesterday's Winter Classic game at Citizens Bank Park, nothing can take away from the experience of being there. It was a tremendous event from start to finish, and the snow flurries that were blowing around the stadium during the late second period and second intermission added to atmosphere without hampering game play.
Every year, the majority of players publicly praise the quality of the ice after the Winter Classic. The flow of the game play compared with the majority of indoor games this time of year -- lots of hopping pucks, both teams having difficulty completing long passes, lots of stoppages where the officials and ice crew try to smooth over ruts or rough patches on the playing surface -- says otherwise. At any rate, both clubs had to deal with the same conditions, so it had no effect on the outcome.
As I wrote in yesterday's game preview, while scoring first and taking a lead to an intermission are huge statistical indicators of the probability of a team winning at the end of the night, nothing is ever a lock until the final horn sounds. Anything can happen in any given game, and that's the beauty (and sometimes frustration) of this sport.
The Flyers should have had the game under total control when they built a 2-0 lead in the second period on Brayden Schenn's rebound tally (his first career NHL goal) and Claude Giroux's beauty of a backhander under the crossbar. Henrik Lundqvist had no chance on either play, and that's what the Flyers needed to do win the game. They needed to render him a non-factor.
Alas, the Flyers committed two cardinal sins that ultimately cost them dearly.
First, they gave up a goal just 30 seconds after Giroux scored; how often does it seem like games where the team that yields a goal on the shift immediately after scoring or being scored upon ends up regretting the latter goal?
The goal, Mike Rupp's first of two, came off a nice shot where Andrej Meszaros perhaps backed off a little too much and he snapped it over a partially screened Sergei Bobrovsky. I wouldn't classify that one as a soft goal necessarily, but it was a potentially stoppable one if the goalie had come up big. That was one of those momentum saves -- and Bob DID make a few of those in the game -- that would have gone a long way for Philly.
Second, the Flyers should still have had the game under control with a one-goal lead heading into the third period, especially given the patchy ice. But Bobrovsky did what he absolutely couldn't afford to do when opposing Lundqvist: he gave up a soft goal to the short side.
It is hard to quantify exactly how much damage a soft goal does to a team both hockey-wise and psychologically. I've heard it said that one bad goal "undoes" four big saves, but without pinning an actual number to it, suffice to say that it really, really hurts a team, especially yesterday. It yanked the Flyers out of the driver's seat and soon put Lundqvist and his team into it.
Last but not least, in a game where the Rangers big guns had been held silent up to that point, giving up a pair of goals to a fourth liner like Rupp was disheartening. Just 2:40 of game play later, Brad Richards stepped up to take advantage of a Flyers coverage breakdown in front.
Now the Flyers had to chase the game against Lundqvist and the defensively stingy Rangers -- who are the toughest team in the NHL (even tougher than Boston) against whom to attempt to come back when they have a lead in the third period. Add to that the fact that all of the elements that should have worked FOR the Flyers heading into the period (the dropping temperatures, gusting winds and the patchy ice) were now working against them.
For most of the remainder of the game, the Rangers forced the Flyers to attempt to go 200 feet down the ice to tie the score. The scoring chances were extremely limited but the ones that were there were either calmly stopped by Lundqvist or blocked by the defense. The Flyers got the benefit of a few favorable calls from the officials late in the game, but still couldn't rescue a point out of the game.
As for Danny Briere's penalty shot, hockey doesn't get more dramatic than that. One of the league's premier clutch scorers went up against one of the league's elite netminders, and the goalie won this one. Game, set and match to New York on this night.
The Flyers were left to ponder what could -- and should -- have been. Losing Jaromir Jagr early the game hurt, because the line was buzzing early and (apart from Scott Hartnell's nice feed and Giroux's brilliant finish on the Flyers' second goal) really did not have many good shifts once an ineffective James van Riemsdyk was moved up in the lineup to substitute for Jagr on the top line.
I give Jagr credit for trying to play through his calf injury -- I had thought it was his groin or perhaps his lower back that was giving him problems -- and for remaining on the bench both to remain a member of the team and in case a 5-on-3 game situation arose where he could remain largely stationary and look for a one-timer. Frankly, it never even crossed my mind that Laviolette had "benched" the future Hall of Famer, especially when he had been playing well early in the game.
On the positive side, it was really nice to Schenn rewarded with his first NHL goal. He was one of the Flyers' best players all game, and had knocked on the door several times in the Pittsburgh game so it felt going into the Winter Classic that he was real close to finally getting that elusive first one. Now that it's out of the way, hopefully he'll build on it.
Believe it or not, it may ultimately prove to be a blessing in disguise that Schenn missed so much time over the first three months of the season. Energywise, he has virtually a full tank of gas just as opponents are about hit those dreaded midseason blahs. As long as he does the things he's done in the last two games, Schenn may very soon start to become an increasingly important part of the Philly attack.
In the grand scheme of things, yesterday was just a regular season game. A four-point gap in the standings in early January is still extremely manageable. I still think the Flyers are capable of beating New York in any of the three remaining regular season meeting or, more importantly, in a playoff series. But they will need to do the same things they did to build the lead yesterday and get better goaltending when protecting it.
In the meantime, the Flyers face a new tough test on Thursday when the Chicago Blackhawks come to town. It's time to turn the page and move on with the next strides forward in the marathon that is the NHL season.
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