The Flyers felt like they had a playoff mindset for the last month and a half of the regular season.<\/p>\n
That urgency led to pressure-packed games and louder arenas, especially on home ice as the fan base saw the legitimacy of the Flyers’ playoff push.<\/p>\n
For the team’s youngsters, it was great experience. But it probably doesn’t equate to what’s in store for the Flyers’ best-of-seven first-round matchup with the Penguins.<\/p>\n
Philadelphia is a different animal when the postseason arrives. Sean Couturier knows that better than anyone on the roster.<\/p>\n
“I’ve told them it’s wild,” the Flyers’ captain said Tuesday with a smile. “I think the last couple of weeks, we’ve felt the atmosphere in the building kind of take another level. But I keep kind of reminding them that it’s really nothing compared to playoffs in Philly.<\/p>\n
“Everyone in orange, right in warmups, everyone’s there in their seats and ready to go and screaming, getting under the other team’s skin a little bit at times. It’s a lot fun, there’s a lot of passion in the building. I’m excited for our group.”<\/p>\n
The Flyers snapped their five-year postseason drought with a concerted climb in the standings, a run that was capped off Monday night<\/a>. Now they’re set to renew their rivalry with Pittsburgh starting Saturday night for Game 1<\/a>.<\/p>\n Here are three thoughts on the series.<\/p>\n Experience vs. inexperience<\/p>\n The Penguins are rich with playoff pedigree. The Flyers, on the other hand, have 13 first-timers.<\/p>\n “I think I saw something today where they have, like, 1,027 playoff games and we have 100 or something like that,” Trevor Zegras said Thursday. “So it’s going to be a good challenge for us, the battle of Pennsylvania. I grew up watching these two teams go to war for years, so it’s exciting to be a part of it.”<\/p>\n Sidney Crosby owns 180 games of postseason experience and three Stanley Cup titles. He’s one of five players on Pittsburgh’s roster that has won a Stanley Cup. When Crosby won his first, Porter Martone was 2 years old.<\/p>\n So the Penguins won’t be rattled by the magnitude of the moment. But they could feel a lot more on their shoulders. Their core is trying to capitalize on one more run. The Flyers don’t have much to lose. They’re very much playing with house money and a mentality of “us against the world.”<\/a><\/p>\n The Flyers, though, have to find a way to combat Crosby. There has been no bigger Flyers killer than No. 87. Travis Sanheim has seen Crosby up close as an opponent and as a teammate with Team Canada at the Olympics, 4 Nations Face-Off and IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship.<\/p>\n “Have a ton of respect for him and what he has done throughout his career,” Sanheim said Thursday. “Yet if I respect him, I want to play him hard. I know that I’m going to have to be playing lots against him. I’m looking forward to the battle.”<\/p>\n Rick Tocchet knows Crosby well, too.<\/p>\n “You’ve got to go through him, you’ve got to be on top of him, you’ve got to make it a hard game for him, you’ve got to get in his way,” the Flyers’ head coach said Thursday. “Because if you’re not, you know what he can do.”<\/p>\n Tocchet was an assistant coach with the Penguins when they won back-to-back titles in 2016 and 2017.<\/p>\n “We have a ton of respect for Sid, he’s an unbelievable person and player,” Tocchet said, “but we’ve got to get him in the ditches. We’ve got to make it hard on him.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Keep the playing field even<\/p>\n A major key for the Flyers will be keeping the game at 5-on-5.<\/p>\n They did not have an effective regular season on special teams. They sported the 22nd-ranked penalty kill (77.6 percent) and the league’s worst power play (15.7 percent).<\/p>\n Since March 1, the Flyers were tied for the second-most power play goals allowed with 19. But in that span, they were excellent at 5-on-5, giving up a league-low 30 goals.<\/p>\n So it’s not just a hockey clich\u00e9. The Flyers need to stay out of the penalty box. Especially when you consider that Pittsburgh can really score. The Penguins put up the NHL’s third-most goals per game (3.54) and had the seventh-best power play (24.1 percent).<\/p>\n “They’ve got a ton of skill on that side, I’ve played with Sid a number of times,” Sanheim said. “We want to stay disciplined throughout the series and keep it at 5-on-5. I think we’ve done a nice job of that throughout the season and it’s something that we’re going to have to continue to do. It’s going to be super important in the series.”<\/p>\n The Flyers were not a high-end goal-scoring team during the regular season. Their offense dried up at times. But they were as stingy as anyone down the stretch<\/a>. They went 18-6-1 over their final 25 games and surrendered just 2.36 goals per game.<\/p>\n Dan Vladar has shown he can carry a team in net<\/a>. He has spoken highly of the Flyers’ locker room.<\/p>\n “When I signed, I had 15 guys reaching out to me the first day in free agency, which I was shocked about,” Vladar said Thursday. “That’s not common. Just those little things show how much the guys care for each other.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Michkov has momentum<\/p>\n There’s no doubt Matvei Michkov is an X-factor for the Flyers. They went 11-0-0 in the regular season when the 21-year-old winger recorded a multi-point game.<\/p>\n He came on strong as the games got bigger. Over the Flyers’ last 16 games, Michkov led the team with 18 points (four goals, 14 assists). He also had a plus-11 rating in that span.<\/p>\n Michkov finished the regular season with 20 goals and 51 points. That was a real positive considering\u00a0how everything went before the Olympic break in February<\/a>.<\/p>\n Tocchet has seen a more comfortable Michkov \u2014 from his participation in team meetings<\/a> to understanding the coaches<\/a> and connecting with teammates.<\/p>\n “I’m going to be honest with you guys, earlier in the season, he wasn’t a loner, but he was kind of alone a lot,” Tocchet said. “Now he’s around with the young guys. I think it’s a huge development for Mich.<\/p>\n “He has actually stepped up his English, but he’s more involved. The other night, he was out to dinner with three rookie guys. I think that’s huge, for his development, too.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Flyers felt like they had a playoff mindset for the last month and a half of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":554243,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5112],"tags":[1468,339,5,4,1467,56,5205],"class_list":{"0":"post-554242","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-flyers","8":"tag-flyers","9":"tag-flyers-analysis","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-philadelphia","13":"tag-philadelphia-flyers","14":"tag-philadelphiaflyers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116417570021584215","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=554242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/554243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=554242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=554242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=554242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}