Thursday Practice News & Quotes

Best wishes for a speedy recovery go out to Montreal Canadiens head coach Claude Julien. The Stanley Cup and Jack Adams Award winning coach is hospitalized after reportedly suffering chest pains on Wednesday night. He is not expected to be able to return behind the bench in this series. For now, associate coach Kirk Muller will serve as the Canadiens' head coach.

Flyers head coach Alain Vigneault said after Thursday's practice that he has known Julien well since AV was 20 years old. He plans on reaching out to his longtime friend. In terms of news from Flyers practice, Vigneault took more positives than negatives from the team's 2-1 win on Wednesday night. While the coach was displeased with his team's puck management and gaps, he like the close-out performance in the third period.

Specific to the lineup adjustments the team made on Wednesday, Vigneault had the following to say.

1) Voracek to LW3

Jakub Voracek has spent most of his career on his off-wing and, in the past, has expressed a preference for playing the right side. In Game 1, with Joel Farabee continuing to play the right wing on Sean Couturier's line, Voracek played left wing on Derek Grant's line. Apart from Voracek being credited with a first period power play goal, Vigneault liked Voracek's 5-on-5 performance and seems inclined to stick with it for now.

Vigneault: "I thought he was strong on the puck, good on the forecheck. Overall, I thought he played a strong game. There are adjustments to make for everyone. Right now, we think that's where he can help our team."

2. JVR on LW4

With Farabee on the top line, and scoring what proved to be the game-winning goal, and Voracek on the third line, veteran James van Riemsdyk skated on the fourth line with Nate Thompson and Tyler Pitlick. Vigneault said that it's important for JVR to play the same style regardless of the line on which he plays.

Vigneault: "JVR on the 4th line or the 1st line doesn't change the way he has to play -- north-south, go to the net. On that line, with Nate, I thought that line had some good looks and good matchups."

3. Blueprint for victory.

While several Montreal players said after Game 1 that they felt their dominant second period showed they can be effective against the Flyers, Philadelphia players pointed to their emphatic closeout in the 3rd period as the blueprint for the way they want to approach playing the Canadiens: taking time and space away from the Canadiens, managing the puck well, and getting their own forecheck established. The Habs, despite trailing by a goal, generated only six shots and only a couple of scoring chances.

Justin Braun: "I think we've got to be a little harder in some areas, a little smarter. They did a good job capitalizing on our mistakes. We've got to keep things a little simpler and get to playing how we did in the third."

4. A step forward for Ghost.

Coming off a stellar training camp and round-robin, Shayne Gostisbehere was restored to the Flyers' starting lineup in Game 1 against the Canadiens, replacing Robert Hägg on the third pairing with Justin Braun. Vigneault said that while -- like the entire team -- both Gostisbehere individually and his pairing with Braun had some rough patches in the second period where they "bent a little bit, but didn't break," he was happy with Gostisbehere's overall performance. That was especially true in the third period.

Braun said after practice that, from his standpoint, it is not hard to make the adaptation from Hägg to Gostisbehere as a partner, or vice versa.

Braun: "Nothing too much. Hägger is a little more physical, creating loose pucks by separating his guy from the puck. Ghost is more stick on puck. Either way can work. There are some small adjustments, but nothing major."

The Day After: A Deep Dive

Coping with Danault Line

Moving forward in this series, the Flyers are going to need to do a little better job -- at least compared to the first 40 minutes of the game -- in handling the forechecking and speed of Montreal's trio with Phillip Danault centering Artturi Lehkonen and Paul Byron.

Overall, that Habs line had the following underlying stats. Danault logged 20:59 TOI, 2 shots, 3 shot attempts, 5 credited hits, 16-for-28 on faceoffs, 60.61% individual Corsi, and four credited takeaways. Lekhonen had 3 shots on goal, 8 shot attempts, 4 credited hits, 2 credited takeaways, and 62.86 percent on-ice Corsi, Byron had 2 shots on goal, one credited takeaway, and a 60 percent on-ice Corsi. At one juncture in the second period, the Flyers caught a huge break when a developing 2-on-0 went awry as puck-carrier Lehkonen lost his footing and the puck slid harmlessly away.

Danault was dominant in the faceoff circle in the first two periods, on a rare night when Claude Giroux (8-for-18) was not at his best in the circle.

Vigneault: "I think he was 70% there after two periods. I didn't make any adjustments. We have been a good faceoff team. There's a good internal communication between our guys that take draws. They help one another out. Most of the night, I thought it was either G or Coots. Obviously Danault did a great job those first two periods. We got a little bit better in the third."

Giroux's night

Giroux narrowly missed his first goal of the 2020 postseason when he hit the post (second time in the postseason that he's drawn iron) on a second period shot that beat Carey Price cleanly. He did get his first assist of the playoffs on the first period power play goal originally credited to Ivan Provorov but later changed to Jakub Voracek after postgame replays revealed the puck glanced off Voracek's leg on its path to the net.

From a puck possession standpoint at even strength, the Flyers top line with Sean Couturier, Giroux and Joel Farabee had an edge against Jesperi Kotkaniemi's line, broke even against Nick Suzuki's line, struggled a bit against Danault's line, and utterly decimated the Montreal fourth line centered by Max Domi with wingers Dale Weise and Alex Belzile.

Couturier (46.67% Corsi) and Giroux (40.0%) had their only negative differentials on the night when matched against Danault's trio. However, with the last line change, Vigneault was able to get his top line out against the Montreal fully intact fourth line for a total of 2:49. During those shifts, Montreal was hemmed in virtually the entire time. Couturier and Giroux had a perfect 100 percent Corsi (in other words, all shot attempts came from the Flyers side) with the full Montreal fourth line on the ice, and 80 percent overall when they were out against Domi with those or other forwards.

Shift Chart notes

Giroux averaged 33 seconds per shift across his 13:34 of 5-on-5 ice time on Wednesday; an efficient total in which he only had four long shifts among his overall 24 shifts. Among all players on the Flyers in Game 1, defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere had the longest shifts at 5-on-5, averaging 50 seconds across his 18 shifts. Average shift times for the other Flyers' defensemen at 5-on-5 were as follows: Provorov (0:41), Matt Niskanen (0:42), Travis Sanheim (0:39), Phil Myers (0:43) and Justin Braun (0:41).

Puck possession seesaw

Beyond shots on goal totals, the puck-possession disparities from period-to-period in Game 1 were truly striking. First, the good news from the Flyers standpoint. In the first and third periods, the Flyers respectively had 54.29 percent and 58.33 percent team Corsi shares (percentage of all shot attempts) at 5-on-5. How ugly was the second period, however? The Flyers got caved in to the tune of a 28.57 percent Corsi.

In terms of high-danger chances, the Flyers yielded a combined seven in the first (5) and third (2) periods combined. But they yielded six in the middle frame. From an expected goals standpoint, the Habs finished with 2.24 to the Flyers' 1.63 per Natural Stat Trick. That disparity was mostly due to the Flyers' poor second period.

Flyers defenseman Ivan Provorov hit the nail on the head when he was asked after Game 1 what the team did so much better in their strong closeout to the game in the third period than they did in the second period. Puck management and gap control were lacking in the second period, but were largely corrected in the final 20 minutes.

Provorov: "I think we just didn't play our game in the second period. We turned the puck over at the blue line. We turned the puck over in our zone. That kind of created momentum for them. They had a lot of possession and that's why they were able to create chances. Hartsy did a great job and he kept us in the game. When we got out there for the third, we finally started playing our game. We put the puck deep, went on the forecheck, had a few power plays that helped us create the momentum and keep playing our game."

QUICK HITS: August 13, 2020 (Carter Hart Edition)

1) There are two notable Flyers birthdays on Aug. 13: Hockey Hall of Famer and franchise icon Bob Clarke was born in Flin Flon, Manitoba, on this day in 1949. On Aug. 13, 1998, Flyers goalie Carter Hart was born in Sherwood Park, Alberta. Hart could hardly have given himself a better early birthday present than his stellar 27-save performance in Game 1. Hart almost single-handedly lifted his team through what could have been a disastrous second period.

2) Much has been made entering the series of the fact that veteran superstar Montreal goaltender Carey Price was Hart's childhood idol when he was growing up in the Edmonton suburbs. Less known is the fact that there's a Flyers connection in Price's family. Carey's father, Jerry Price, was drafted by the Flyers in the eighth round (126th overall) of the 1978 NHL Draft. The elder Price, who was also a goaltender, played briefly in the old International Hockey League but otherwise spent most of his three-season pro career in lower minor leagues. As with the late Pelle Lindbergh and many other goalies who were children or teenagers during the heyday of the Broad Street Bullies, Jerry Price idolized Flyers legend Bernie Pareint.

3) Speaking of the NHL Draft, there was a ripple effect in 2016 when the Flyers stockpiled three picks in the second round. In addition to their own pick (48th overall), the Flyers acquired an early second-round pick (36th overall, Pascal Laberge) along with the 22nd overall pick (German Rubtsov) from the Winnipeg Jets when they agreed to move down from the 18th overall pick in order for the Winnipeg Jets to draft hulking defenseman Logan Stanley. One year earlier, the Flyers acquired 2015 and 2016 (52nd overall) second-round picks from the Chicago Blackhawks in exchange for soon-to-retire defenseman Kimmo Timonen.

Fortified with three picks in the 2016 second round, the Flyers were emboldened to become the first NHL team to select a goalie -- Hart -- in that year's Draft. Although many considered Hart the best goalie in that year's Draft-eligible crop, teams are often leary of taking a goaltender "too early" in the Draft. That's because goaltenders generally take the longest to develop of any position (Hart has been one of the exceptions to that rule of thumb) and also entrail the most risk to project at the NHL level.

In hindsight, the Flyers got a bit lucky that they were still able to get Hart with the 48th overall pick. In a "hindsight re-draft" there's no way he'd have been around by the time the Flyers made the second of their three picks in the round. Shortly after the Flyers chose Hart, there was a run on goalie selections, with four netminders chosen over the next 13 picks: Tyler Parsons by Calgary at 54th overall, Filip Gustavsson by Pittsburgh at 55th overall, Evan Fitzpatrick by St. Louis at 59th overall and USNTDP goalie Joseph Woll by Toronto at 62nd overall.

To date, Hart is one of only two goalies chosen in the 2016 Draft to appear in an NHL game. The other is Swedish goaltender Adam Werner (5th round, 131st overall), who made his NHL debut for the Colorado Avalanche during the 2019-20 regular season and appeared in two games overall. Hart is the only one to date who is already an established starter in the NHL.