Giroux powers Flyers to second round

PHILADELPHIA, Pa. – It took only 32-seconds for Flyers’ leader Claude Giroux to set the tone on the night. The star forward outright demanded the first shift from his coach, and didn’t disappoint from the opening face-off all the way to a 5-1 series clinching victory over their cross-state rival Pittsburgh Penguins.
 
Claude Giroux has been more than a star player for the Flyers, he’s developed into the leader the team needs at this point in the season with its captain veteran defenseman Chris Pronger out for the season.
 
“Not only leadership but his game tonight was monstrous, it really was,” said Flyers’ coach Peter Laviolette. “When the best player in the world comes up to you and tells you, ‘I don’t know who you’re planning on starting tonight, but I want that first shift’, that says everything you need to know about Claude Giroux right there.”
 
The game began with a face-off between Giroux and Pen’s star Sidney Crosby. In the opening moments Giroux laid out Crosby with a bone-crushing check at center-ice, and then went on to open the scoring on the first shot of the night, with a rising wrister from the top of the circle.
 
Giroux finished the night with a goal, 2-assists, 2-blocked shots, and a plus-2 rating. On the playoffs, he now has 6-goals, 8-assists, to lead the NHL playoffs with 14-points. But he hasn’t just been doing it in the playoffs. Giroux led his team with 93-points in the regular season, good enough for third in the league in that department.
 
Giroux set the tone early, and his team followed suit putting together one of the finest 60-minute efforts this team’s played in a good long while, and it couldn’t have happened at a better time.
 
“G’s probably the biggest competitor that I have ever played with,” said winger Scott Hartnell who finished with a goal on the night. “He wants to win so bad. I could tell right when I got to the rink this morning that he was fired up and ready to go. When you hit like that on the first shift, that’s our best guy in here and he played a great game tonight.”
 
The Flyers played a strong team game from the net out, and the determination was clear on the ice from everyone. The Flyers blocked an incredible 40-shots in front of netminder Ilya Bryzgalov, led by rookie defenseman Erik Gustafsson with 7-blocks, who also tallied his first NHL playoff goal in only his second playoff game.
 
The young blueliner was strong with and without the puck. He had a total of 21:27 of ice-time, earning the coach’s trust, and played a good amount of big minutes. The Pens attempted to keep regular season points leader Evgeni Malkin away from both Kimmo Timonen and Braydon Coburn, the Flyers’ shutdown tandem, and Gustafsson routinely drew the short straw having to match-up with the wiley Malkin on several shifts. The 23-year-old did a great job finishing with a plus-3, 2-hits and a takeaway. Malkin finished with 6-shots and one goal, but not while Gustafsson was on the ice.
 
Along with the shot-blocking the Flyers defense was a force around Bryzgalov, taking 32-hits on the night to keep the porch clear and they didn’t give the Pens much of a chance at rebounds. The Pens outshot the Flyers 31-23, but most of the shots came from the perimeter, and Bryzgalov didn’t have much trouble keeping his team in the game.
 
All in all, the Flyers put up a convincing win to move on to the second round, and being the first team to clinch in the Eastern Conference, they’ll have a bit of time to lick their wounds before meeting their next opponent.
 
Veteran centerman Danny Briere said, “Just like I said, it’s all about sacrificing the body, I’m not going to talk about who was injured and who’s gotten through a lot but I can tell you that there’s a lot of guys that have been in huge [inaudible] just for a spot to be in the line up, but the way everybody sacrificed… I’ve been here for 5 years and it was one of the experiences I might be the most proud of. Sometimes you win a game with 5,6,7 guys that really go above and beyond the call of duty but today I can’t even think of one guy that didn’t do that and that makes me proud.”
 
Many of the Flyers have been nursing injuries for some time, and a short break will do them well. Bryzgalov played through a chip fracture in his right foot, Pavel Kubina was held to only 4:31 of ice-time due to a lower-body injury, and Timonen was seen afterwards limping with a big bag of ice wrapped around his right knee. These in addition to key defensive members missing from the line-up, such as Nik Grossman (concussion),Andrej Meszaros (back surgery), and Marc-Andre Bourdon (concussion), have left the Flyers blueline nearly succumbing to attrition. A few extra days of rest will be huge going into the next round.
 
Since no other Eastern Conference series has been decided there’s no telling who the Flyers will face in the next round, but the way the team’s will to win carried them past the heavily favored Pens, this may just be the favored team to come out of the east.
 
Contact Chuck.Tay@prohockeynews.com
Photographer Lewis.Bleiman@prohockeynews.com