Sunday Puck Picks

[Raji]

Philadelphia at Pittsburgh (-215, 5)

The Flyers were off their game on Friday night, but you shouldn't be all that surprised. The team learned shortly before game time that their top defenseman, Kimmo Timonen would be out for the rest of the playoffs due to a bloodclot in his ankle. That seemed to throw off their rhythm for the whole game.

The major problem the Flyers had was breaking out of their own zone. Time after time, Philadelphia coaches saw a gap being created in the neutral zone as forwards skated down the ice too fast and defensemen were too slow brining up the puck. That situation led to turnovers in the neutral zone and a lot of room for Pittsburgh’s forwards to operate and create scoring chances.

Fortunately for Philadelphia backers, that problem can be fixed.

"We had a meeting this morning and addressed it," Flyers head coach John Stevens said after Saturday's practice. "We get out of our end, we get through the neutral zone, and we spend more time in the offensive zone.

"We didn't spend nearly enough time in the offensive zone [Friday] night because of it. And we spent too much time on our own end because of it. That needs to change."

Pittsburgh’s Evegeni Malkin was another major issue for Philadelphia in Game 1 and while they won’t be able to completely shut down the shifty Russian, they can certainly defend him with more intensity than they did on Friday. The Flyers’ defencemen gave Malkin far too much space when he was carrying the puck because they were obviously tentative to attack him.

"Did you see how the defense reacted every time [Malkin] had the puck?" Penguins forward Gary Roberts told the Toronto Sun after the game. "They were back-pedalling, afraid of making mistakes. You play that way, you can't win."

You can bet that Stevens also addressed that issue at Saturday’s practice and Malkin won’t get nearly as much room to skate with the puck in Game 2.

Pick: Flyers

Raji