Laviolette roasts Flyers; what will GM do?
The Philadelphia Inquirer Blog - Flyers Report: Broad Street Bull
Laviolette roasts Flyers; what will GM do?
Sam Carchidi, Inquirer Staff Writer
Nine games into his Flyers coaching tenure, Peter Laviolette sharply criticized his team's inability to play 60 hard minutes in their 2-1 loss to the visiting New York Rangers Saturday.
He called their performance "unacceptable."
Defenseman Chris Pronger called the developments _ 13 losses in their last 16 games _ "mystifying."
The Flyers are back to being the Legion of Gloom.
After just 5:16, Laviolette called a timeout following a Claude Giroux turnover that led to a Rangers goal. During the timeout, Laviolette chastised his players and it seemed to wake them up.
For a while, anyway.
They dominated the rest of the first period and held a 16-5 shots advantage in the final period. But they were listless in the middle period.
“It was a poor start. There’s no excuse for it. I can’t think of one reason why we would come out flat, and we did,” said Laviolette in a measured, angry tone. “And we needed a timeout to try to refocus. I would have thought we would have ripped the hinges off the gate tonight to get out on the ice. We were so far from that, in my opinion, to start the game, and we got what we deserved. We’re outshot, 6-1, we turn the puck over and it’s in the back of the net.”
Henrik Lundqvist was the difference in the game. The Rangers goalie made 36 saves, includng a pair of eye-openers in the final period on James van Riemsdyk.
The Flyers are 2-6-1 since Laviolette replaced John Stevens.
“This is about the Philadelphia Flyers playing a brand of hockey that you can be proud of, and I don’t know how anyone can possibly be proud after the first two periods,” Laviolette said. “It’s completely unacceptable.”
Simon Gagne returned to the lineup after missing nearly two months because of hernia and abdominal surgery. The left winger had an assist as Pronger scored a power-play goal with 11:47 left in the first period.
For the rest of the game, the Flyers couldn't solve Lundqvist. They have scored more than three goals just twice in their last 18 games, and they have eight goals in their last nine losses.
There is a holiday trading freeze in effect until after Dec. 27. One wonders if GM Paul Holmgren will exhibit patience or make a major shakeup _ Jeff Carter, who had eight shots Saturday but continued to be snakebitten, is his most coveted player _ before the Winter Classic on Jan. 1.
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This same core made a run to the conference finals two seasons ago. I'm not ready to call them heartless bums, it seems lazy.— MD20202020- Comment removed.
- Why is Briere still on this team? Montreal wanted him, send him. Glad to see folks have focused in on what a zero Hartnell is. Wht do either of these two guys bring? Why can't the flyers ever win a shootout? Is it that hard? And finally, looks like another flyers re-tread of Emery failed like every other re-tread(forsberg). When will fyers get a true player in his heyday.— thebaron
How could Briere once be the highest-paid player in the entire NHL? Okay, he's not a bad player, but he has a megabucks long-term contract when in fact being worth maybe 2.5 to 3 million $ a year. And that despite his atrocious numbers in the plus/minus ratings, his frequent injuries and lack of size and increasing lack of speed due to age. How can you give a guy like that such a contract?- People have been saying that the goalie situation for the Flyers has not been the real problem. However, I have to disagree with that. I am well aware of how bad the defense is or, better put, how bad the Flyers, in general, can play defensively, so turnovers occur and suddenly the mediocre defense has to be superb to stop a rush. But, I really think that the main problem that the Flyers have and have had is the goalie situation. Boucher is going to stop most of the shots he sees, he's an alright goalie, sure, but it's the shots that get by him about which the commentators say "Oh, well, that wasn't the goalie's fault at all, he didn't have a chance on that one" that interest me. Consider a goalie like Ryan Miller - of course, like any goalie, he's not impervious, but the reason he's so good is that for even those shots that he has absolutely "no chance" at stopping, he stops a good percentage of them, somehow, some way. The average NHL goalies won't stop those kinds of shots on a regular basis and Boucher is just an average NHL goalie. And that's nothing against him, but it's just not good enough. Did you see the stop Fleury made against the Flyers where he was lying on his back in the crease and, as the puck sailed above him toward the open net, he stuck his glove up and swatted it down? Boucher wouldn't have done that. It would've been a goal and the commentators would have said, "He had no chance on that one. It was just a great job by So-and-so of being in front of the net and getting the rebound..."— mulhod
- okay...real quick...how many of you have been posting for months that Stevens is the problem, and that he had to go? Guess what??????— hospodar
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- is it posible they are protesting the firing of Stevens?— frank martino
- The team just doesn't care when they are out there. They can say whatever they want in the papers.— kozykoz26
- You put Ken Dryden in back of these guys and he'd get lit up...They are a bunch of overpaid chumps...Richards, Carter, and Hartnell are the legion of SUCK— pucky88
- no charachter,no heart,no urgency..ty homer— soliteryman
- Its time for Comcast to dump them all from Snyder on down. This is a minor league team with a major league salary. Start with a good goalie and build around that...gees where have ya gone Bernie— crseloc
- I have never seen so many blind and backwards passes to nobody or the other team. When I coached my son's mites team the 1st thing I taught them was that If you don't know where the puck is going then don't pass it. The give-away's kill kill momentum and lead to opposition chances. If you can't put the puck where you want it, make the other team come and take it from you rather than just hand it to them. This team needs a real basic's crash course.— dedhed
- Why would we trade Carter? Carter is the only one who seems to be playing with any energy and effort.— realisticobserver
