[eleven24]

Found a few interesting articles on the series from the Toronto media...

The Toronto Star, 4/28
...the Leafs are dealing with the deadly combination of a hot goalie on a team that executes a stifling defensive system to near perfection...

Pat Quinn, whining again, Toronto Sun, 4/28
"I don't mind the traffic. That's what teams are supposed to do. When you cross the line, you are supposed to get penalties, but that has not happened. In spite of all the good words (the officials) are not bothering to emphasize that sort of thing. I don't want to be a victim. We'll have to play with the circumstances that are there."

The Toronto Star, 4/27
The Leafs are playing far better against the Philadelphia Flyers than they did the Senators, but they are discovering that it's almost impossible to beat a team when it possesses three things in the post-season ? superior goaltending, better special teams and timely, balanced scoring.

Dave Schultz on playing with the BS Bullies
"This [Philadelphia] is a tough sports town, but there is a saying. Win in Philadelphia and you'll be remembered forever. That's what happened with us."

The Toronto Star, 4/27
When Donald Brashear scored in Game 2, he became the 12th Flyer to record a goal in this year's playoffs. Only Calgary, with 13, has more players contributing to the offensive attack. What makes the Flyers even scarier is that the line of Michal Handzus between John LeClair and Mark Recchi has accounted for just one playoff goal so far.

[TonyFatt]

On a related note, here are some things I'm hearing from people:

1. Everyone says the Leafs should've won Game 2 and supposedly badly outplayed the Flyers. (What??)

2. Everyone is whining and complaining about Brashear's supposed goalie interference. When I point out that it was Recchi doing the "goalie interference", and that he barely touched Belfour and moved away quickly, they usually shut up.

3. Almost all my Leaf fan friends predict a huge Leaf blowout in Game 3. (What?? again.)

EDIT: People are also complaining about Brashear's cross checking on McCabe, also before he scored his goal.

[Jlg-28]

from TSN.com

Bryan McCabe said. ``They got a lucky break.'' in game # 1

Tie Domi said " They didn't dominate us at all,''
``They don't have any rough and tumble guys. They aren't the Broad Street Bullies. It is totally different hockey.''
after game # 1

on the before mentioned points

1. The Leafs have had chances to win both games , but they have not been able to solve Esche for more then 1 goal per game, The only period where they have been better then the Flyers is the 2nd period , and I'm sure Hicth and company are workin on that.

2. The Flyers may be makin some contact with Belfour , but Esche has also been interferred with on a few occasions , and has yet to get a call himself , but you don't hear him or the Flyers complaining.

3. Game # 3 will be huge for this series , the leafs will be lookin to get some kind of momentum goin and need a win if they wanna stay alive , for the Flyers , If they play game # 3 like they did game # 4 vs New Jersey , I don't see the leafs gettin anything done. The 1st 10 mins will be key , we all know the leafs will be comming with everything they got , if they flyers withstand that and get the 1st goal then it's all good

so we shall see , so far , this series has been physical , but nothin like lats years matchup.

one more point , The Flyers to me look determined to do what it takes to win , I can remember past playoffs where the team would blow the 1 goal lead late in the game , but so far this playoffs , the team has found the way to hold the other teams off and come out with a win , call it luck , call it determination , better coaching or more discipline players that know how to keep the other teams from scoring , if they continue to play the way they have been , I see this team doing great things

Go ! ! ! Flyers ! ! !

[eleven24]

Funny you say that, Jeff. I was just talking with one of my friends about the Flyers this year.

Last year if the opposition scored a goal in the 3rd to go ahead it was so deflating because it was like "That's it, they're done". Or if the Flyers had the lead I'd always think to myself "They're going to need another goal if they want to win".

This year it's the total opposite. The Flyers could score FIRST in the game & I'm thinking it could be enough to win. They are so disciplined in their defensive system, & Esche is there to back them up when needed.

Reminds me of something I heard awhile back. In the days of the Broad Street Bullies the players would routinely ask Bernie Parent "Hey Bernie, how many goals do you need from us tonight?".

He'd say "Just one."

I think Esche & the Flyers are developing that personality.

[Obama]

They're just jealous. :toothless

[Jlg-28]

From TSN.com

The struggling Toronto Maple Leafs will have a new look on Wednesday in Game Three of the Eastern Conference semifinal against the Philadelphia Flyers at the Air Canada Centre.

The Maple Leafs scored just two goals in the first two games of the series, prompting coach Pat Quinn to shuffle his lineup, returning Alexander Mogilny back to the top line with Mats Sundin and Gary Roberts.

Philadelphia goalie Robert Esche has stopped 48 of 50 shots in the series, leading the Flyers to a 2-1 victory over Toronto in Game Two at the Wachovia Center on Sunday.

Alexei Zhamnov scored the go-ahead goal midway through the third period and Donald Brashear had a power-play tally for Philadelphia, which is unbeaten in 16 postseason series in which it has won the first two games.

Tie Domi scored the lone goal for Toronto, which could not muster much offense despite the return of Sundin, who missed Game One due to a lower body injury. Thanks to his inspired play and an injury to Joe Nieuwendyk, Domi will be playing on the Leafs' second line with Ron Francis and Chad Kilger.

[Drew]

Just a few facts I'm throwing out there...

#1 - Toronto can't crack our stingy defense (this is without Kimmy and Rico, I'd like to add).

#2 - Toronto can't stop our huge forwards crashing in on Eddie.

#3 - even if they do manage to slip by our D, they have to face Mr. Esche. Look at the goals they have scored against us this series, let alone this year. I could be wrong, but I think it's a 17-7 difference.

#4 - we have NEVER lost a series after being up 2-0.

IMHO, this series IS over....even if we do not win tonight.

With the way Hitch has his players buying into the system of his, I do not see Toronto beating us in a 7 game series fellas.

LETS GO FLYERS!!!!!

[Blackdog]

i agree with drew. i think this round's over regardless of how tonight turns out. but toronto isn't ready to swallow that pill that says they've been eliminated from the playoffs by philly yet again, so it should prove interesting.

i also love hearing what the locals are saying in enemy territory!

GO FLYERS!

[Jlg-28]

From: NHL.com

Maple Leafs center Joe Nieuwendyk will sit out Game 3 of Toronto's second-round playoff series with Philadelphia on Wednesday night, the second straight game he'll miss because of back problems.

Nieuwendyk, who leads Toronto with five playoff goals, skated Wednesday for the first time since Game 1 of the series last Thursday.

"I'm getting better every day," Nieuwendyk said. "I think tomorrow I'll get a practice in and step it up a little bit and then go from there."

The Leafs, who host Game 4 on Friday, trail the best-of-seven series 2-0.

Clarke Wilm took Nieuwendyk's place in a 2-1 loss at Philadelphia on Sunday. But Leafs coach Pat Quinn is considering shuffling his lineup by going with gritty forward Wade Belak, who has yet to play this postseason.

The Leafs, who have just two goals against the Flyers, could certainly use Nieuwendyk, who's scored almost a third of Toronto's 16 playoff goals.

Philadelphia defenseman Kim Johnsson could return for Game 4, coach Ken Hitchcock said. Johnsson is considered doubtful for Wednesday and missed the first two games of the series with a broken bone in his right hand.

[eleven24]

Arrrgghhh!!! DREW!!! Don't go saying this series is over!! Knock on some wood right now!

Including the playoffs, the Flyers have outscored Toronto 22-7. 3 of the TO goals game in the last game of the year on only 14 shots - when Esche was slumping. Throw that game out and it's 20-4 in 5 games.

I'll be much happier when the Flyers win that 4th. Ive been a Flyers fan (and Philly sports fan, for that matter) FAR too long to count a team out after 2 games.

Still though, I have a good feeling.

[Blackdog]

i'm still not worried. 2-2 and i'll think differently. i thought this was a good story:

Flyers dole out their own brand of justice

TAKE REVENGE ON MARAUDING MOGILNY, LEAFS

By Rich Hofmann

hofmanr@phillynews.com


TORONTO - The cap came off in the third period, and everybody saw it. First Donald Brashear went off for boarding, then Danny Markov went off for crosschecking, and then Marcus Ragnarsson went off for slashing. It was three penalties for the Flyers in less than 90 seconds, a final, violent burst on what had been a fine, violent night for the Toronto Maple Leafs.

A lack of discipline by the Flyers?

"No," coach Ken Hitchcock said.

Strategy?

"No," Hitchcock said.

Then what?

"It's on the ice," Hitchcock said. "You saw what happened in the first period with one of our guys."

The coach would not elaborate, but this much is known: Even as the Leafs bullied their way back into the series with a rugged, 4-1 victory last night at Air Canada Centre, their first win in the three games played, a subplot also was born.

Specifically, the Flyers appear to have adopted a rough-justice version of the Golden Rule. For last night, anyway, they appear to have decided to do unto Alex what Alex did unto them.

The Alex in question is Alexander Mogilny. What Mogilny did was clobber Ragnarsson against the boards in the middle of the first period, hobbling him for at least a while (even though Ragnarsson did not appear to miss a shift for the rest of the game). What Mogilny also did was clobber Markov, another Flyers defenseman, with a hit from behind into the boards in the third period. The Flyers obviously are sensitive about clobberings in general, but especially on a defense corps already missing its top two players (Eric Desjardins and Kim Johnsson).

And so, now we get to watch Mogilny reap the Flyers' whirlwind. It is a concept as old as the big silver trophy they are all chasing.

"Alex is a good guy, man," Jeremy Roenick said, with a straight face and a soft voice.

Then:

"[Mogilny] almost killed Markov from behind," JR said. "That was a pretty dangerous hit. But you know they are going to need big games from their top players, and Alex is one of their top guys."

The revenge appeared to begin after the hit on Markov. Within seconds, Roenick went after Mogilny in defense of his teammate, and both of them went to the penalty box for roughing.

Then, later in the third, came the most exacting bit of revenge. With the Flyers already trying to kill a five-on-three penalty situation, Ragnarsson took a big, two-handed swing at Mogilny and nailed him in the back of the legs. Ragnarsson received a slashing penalty and Mogilny limped off. Mogilny missed one shift, but played two more at the end of the game.

Things were fairly uneventful after that. And now, we head to Game 4 with the snarl everybody expected all along. If it was a little late in arriving, well, it's now officially here.

That aside, when you look back on it, much of the night was entirely predictable and not terribly concerning for the Flyers, not yet. Everybody knew the Leafs, coming home in desperate straits after two losses in Philadelphia, would throw a serious haymaker in Game 3. And, well, they did, and it landed.

In the first round, the New

Jersey Devils did the exact same thing. Down by 2-0, playing at home, they pounded every Flyers player in sight and won the game. But the question asked that night can be asked again this night, but for a different reason.

The question: Can the Leafs possibly keep hitting like that for four more games? Because that would appear to be their only hope of establishing a beachhead in the Flyers' end, something they desperately need to do to create the traffic and deflections needed to beat Flyers goaltender Robert Esche.

The answer: not likely. The Devils couldn't keep it up, because they were too small. The Leafs can't keep it up, because they're too old and banged up, and because they seem much more disinclined to hit people within the confines of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Or, as Roenick said, picking one example: "That was the most I've seen [Leafs defenseman] Bryan McCabe hit in a long time. He didn't touch one person in Philadelphia. Not one."

So, can the Leafs keep hitting for four more games?

"If they keep doing that, they could be in some trouble," Roenick said. "They're a veteran team, and they've got some guys who are banged up."

The pre-series truths remain self-evident: The Flyers have more skill and more evenly distributed scoring potential than the Leafs; the Flyers' overall rest and health will be a bigger and bigger advantage as the number of games in the series begins to mount.

Nothing has really changed, then.

Nothing except the snarl.

[TonyFatt]

Somehow, that article is very reassuring.

[Blackdog]

Originally posted by TonyFatt
Somehow, that article is very reassuring.

guess it wasn't reassuring enough. bah.

so, what's the word from toronto today? glad i'm in nj this year.

[Blackdog]

well sorta.

[Obama]

I don't know. But, I never knew Eddie Belfour looked like a prisoner. I just saw him on the news, and he was very dreery-eyed.

[Blackdog]

i thought that was his normal look? eh, he's probably hungover. they better enjoy it while it lasts.

go flyers!

[Blackdog]

i guess this story kind of gives us an idea of toronto these days, eh?:

Hotel hijinks get the Flyers up in arms




05/01/2004




By ROB PARENT robparent@aol.com TORONTO -- Flyers goalie Robert Esche was rolling around in his king-sized bed at the Fairmount Royal York Hotel early Wednesday morning, and no wonder. "I?m a light sleeper," Esche said after the Flyers had dropped their second straight game in Toronto Friday night, 3-1 to Maple Leafs. "They knocked about 7:15. I didn?t answer it, because I knew what was going on."

Esche had a clue because some of the same knocking pranksters had come a calling -- on the phone -- at about 5 a.m.


"I put a do-not-disturb on the phone," said Esche, "and they patched it through, anyway. Kind of childish, really. But it?s pretty funny when you think about it."

Of course, the timing could have been better. This is how Esche was forced to prepare for Game 3 that night. This is only part of the fun that Leaf Nation had with the Flyers on their trip to Toronto this week.

Who was knocking at Esche?s door? The same guy that banged on Jeremy Roenick?s hotel door that morning. He was described by a club official as "a lackey" for radio station "The Edge" 102.1-FM, and had gained access to the third floor of the hotel.

But the fun was only beginning.

"They announced Eschie?s room number on the air," said a Flyers executive. "We were warned it could happen. They did the same thing to (goalie Patrick) Lalime when the Senators were here (last week). I had to move Robert to a new room and I didn?t even tell the hotel."

The reason? The Flyers suspect the only way for any prankster to bang on a certain door is to pay off a hotel employee. Club security officials called Toronto police, who removed "the lackey." Police said he wasn?t charged.

"I think it?s a disgrace," said Flyers chairman Ed Snider. "I don?t think it?s at all funny what they did."

But wait, listeners, there was more.

"The Edge" personality Todd Shapiro set up on an island in the middle of the street running in front of the hotel, shouting through a bullhorn for any passersby to hound the Flyers. Then the station sent a staffer to a Tim Horton?s donut shop near the hotel Friday, where Ken Hitchcock and assistant coaches Craig Hartsburg and Wayne Fleming were taking coffee.

Witnesses report Hartsburg escorted the radio guy out of the shop. The Flyers denied that the radio guy was ****aulted."

"They just burst in and start yelling at them and trying to sit at their table," Flyers general manager Bob Clarke said. "What kind of person walks up to a hotel room door and starts banging on it? That?s just stupid. What crosses the line between doing your job and harassment?"

According to Roenick, this wasn?t the first time he was harassed in Toronto. Apparently, the same station sent a guy to his door last year during the playoffs, and he tried to pawn himself off as delivering a plant.

Roenick knew the 102.1 score, so filled his trash can with water then opened the door and splashed the guy. Just watering the plant, you see.

But in what could have been a far more serious incident, Hitchcock was also accosted by a passing "fan" as he was walking back to the hotel from a practice.

"A car pulls over to him and this idiot sticks his head out and screams, ?You?re lucky you weren?t walking in the road you (bleep), or you would have been run over,?" said Clarke. "People up here are getting crazy. It wasn?t like this when I played. It?s gotten nasty. What gives these people the right to do these things, just because we work for a hockey team?"

Hitchcock, who usually likes a spot of playoff fun, wasn?t amused this time. He declined comment on the incidents.

[Jlg-28]

From TSN.com

Captain Keith Primeau found a silver lining to the Philadelphia Flyers' 3-1 loss Friday night to the Toronto Maple Leafs.

``I thought we were better tonight (than in Game 3),'' said Primeau. ``The series is even and now it's a best-of-three.''

Both teammate Jeremy Roenick and coach Ken Hitchcock shared Primeau's confidence.

``It's not going to be all easy, it's not going to be all clean - you have to face adversity,'' Roenick said. ``They got a couple of good opportunities they cashed in on and their goaltending was very good again.

``But we can be a heck of a lot better. There's no doubt about that.''

Philadelphia opened the scoring, which had Hitchcock feeling somewhat optimistic.

``I thought we had a great start to the game,'' he said. ``I thought we did exactly what we wanted to.

``We had a lot of good play by a lot of people today, but Toronto defended very well. They were full value for the way they defended.''

And team defence, Hitchcock said, was the key in the game.

``The difference in the hockey game was that they were better defensively over the 60 minutes than we were,'' he said.

Toronto won both of its home games to tie the best-of-seven series 2-2, but that didn't surprise the Flyers much.

``You look at their lineup, their veteran leadership, and you know they're going to keep coming,'' said Roenick, whose Flyers ousted Toronto in the first round of last season's playoffs. ``We knew that since last year.''

Flyers right-winger Mark Recchi, who has just one goal and two points in nine games this post-season, put the onus on himself to produce more offence.

``I know I have to do a lot better job,'' Recchi said. ``We can't come into another team's building and score two goals (in Toronto's two home games).

``It's disappointing, but we still have home ice (advantage). We came (to Toronto) with the right attitude, but we didn't get the job done.''

Sundin dominated for the home side, scoring the tying and winning goals, and the Flyers couldn't deny his presence in the lineup made a difference.

``He creates so much for them, he's got great speed through the neutral zone,'' Primeau said of Sundin. ``You can't give him time and space, but that's what we did tonight.''


My Thughts:
The Flyers need to play thier best game tomorrow if they want to have a chane to win , they need to get back to disturbing Belfour without takin a penalty , this game will be the biggest game of the year so far and the pressure will be on both teams , but more will be on the home team