Game 44 vs Philadelphia Flyers
4/20/2013
5-3 Loss
ES GOALS FOR
1st 13:18 Skinner (unassisted)
+1 Skinner - Nice to see Skinner playing more aggressive defense and profiting off the turnover. A glimmer of hope that he's starting to "get" two-way hockey.
+1 Jordan Staal - Again, good aggressive forechecking.
+1 Gleason - Well-timed pinch to cause the turnover.
2nd 7:19 Faulk (Wallace, Westgarth)
+1 Wallace - What I love about this goal is that if Wallace isn't quite so eager to put a body on that Flyer defender, the clearing pass probably gets out of the zone. If he shies away from that hit on the boards, he doesn't get the puck back to Faulk. Between him and Westgarth and Blanchard, this whole sequence was born out of pure competitive willpower.
+1 Westgarth - This is probably the best hockey play Westgarth made all season.
+1 Blanchard - Easy save for the goalie if Blanchard's butt isn't in his face.
+1 Faulk - Another good example of taking power off a shot to make it more dangerous.
3rd 2:43 Eric Staal (Tlusty, Semin)
+1 Faulk - Pretty good display of hand-eye-foot coordination to get that puck up the ice.
+1 Semin - Playmaking sense = off the charts.
+1 Tlusty - He has the easiest job in the league. Skate in a straight line at the net, receive beautiful passes, take open shots, collect points.
+1 Eric Staal - Simple enough.
ES GOALS AGAINST
1st 7:00 Voracek (Giroux)
-1 Jordan Staal - That's just an awful, awful turnover. The defensemen and especially Peters never stood a chance.
2nd 1:54 Simmonds (Read)
-1 Bergeron - And that's why this guy was available for trade. A CHL defenseman would be expected to kill that pass.
2nd 8:33 Simmonds (Couturier, Read)
-1 Tlusty - This one is a bit of a judgment call, since the defense was kind of scrambly and Tlusty had switched assignments with Staal. It appears to me that Tlusty, playing the center assignment, simply got absorbed by the corner battle and drifted too low to provide puck support. Which is the decision you'd expect from a board-working winger, but there's a reason they call it a "center". Staal and Semin were glued to the points, so there was nobody left covering the center lane except Harrison, who as a defenseman is not supposed to step out to the high slot.
-1 Corvo - Coverage factors aside, Corvo simply got overpowered in the corner.
3rd 0:48 Simmonds (Schenn)
Goalie Error - Peters - This is about the time I started feeling kind of bad for Peters.
3rd 7:03 Read (Simmonds)
-1 McBain - I guess he was in a bit of a tough spot, but still. If he simply stands up and skates hard, he at least gets a stick on Read during that breakaway.
Totals
+2 Faulk
+1 Blanchard
+1 Gleason
+1 Semin
+1 Skinner
+1 Eric Staal
+1 Tlusty
+1 Wallace
+1 Westgarth
-1 Bergeron
-1 Corvo
-1 McBain