Wednesday, April 11, 2012

CAN I GO BACK ON THAT PREDICTION?

After losing at least twice to the Flyers this season after taking 2-0 leads the Penguins blow a THREE-to-nothing lead and lose in OT. It's kind of like when the Steelers score 20 points in the first five minutes and then get only a field goal the rest of the game. Even if you win, that's no way to win. You can't build up any momentum that way. Even if the Flyers had LOST,  they still would have had the momentum after coming back from a 3-goal deficit.


Fortunately I didn't see ANY of the Flyers' goals. My wife wanted to watch something else and we missed the whole second period. And when I saw what the score was at the end of two periods I decided not to watch it as recorded. I also fast-forwarded through the Flyers PP and didn't "see" that goal. THEN, somehow we got off onto another NBC channel or something (with the Detroit-Nashville game) while waiting for the OT intermission to end and suddenly my phone goes off with an ESPN update and, shit, they lost.


Not really a surprise. You could see the momentum slipping away. The Flyers had WAY too many opportunities in the Penguins' zone in the third period. The other factor was the Flyers were hitting EVERYBODY. They did not pass up one check while the Penguins took the night off in that category except for a few notable exceptions. I know the "Hits" totals were similar but you could see the Flyers were making theirs count.

Actually, the Pens were lucky they made it to OT. If not for scoring that late goal in the first period it would have been over 2:23 sooner. 



I don't know HOW you recover from this. The Flyers were hitting AND interfering AND holding AND throwing LATE hits and only received three penalties. In Philadelphia they'll do EVEN MORE of that and probably not have anything called. Another problem was the Flyers scored on their lone PP and the Penguins screwed up three chances. Yeah, they screwed them up. Too many passes that didn't hit their mark, too few shots, not enough hustle. When Philadelphia out HUSTLES you, you're in for a LONG (short) series. I know the Pens lost the first TWO games of every series in 2009 winning the Stanley Cup but that had NEVER been don before and probably WON'T be done again. Speaking of done... Have you all got your drivers tuned up? You may want to start.


Sorry, I don't want to spend any more time on this than necessary so NO PICTURES EITHER.

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