Paging Claude Giroux and Travis Konecny!
How does a team that is the hottest team in the NHL at the work stoppage, winners of 9 of 10 and easily winning the round-robin series against the other top 3 teams in the conference, down 3 games to 1 against a team that seemed to be going in the opposite direction at the work stoppage?
The answer to me is simple really and lies squarely on the shoulders of 2 players, captain Claude Giroux and the team’s regular-season leading scorer, Travis Konecny.
Paging Captain Claude Giroux
Let’s start with Captain Claude. The guy who ranks 4th in points in the entire NHL during the decade from 2010 to 2020 is currently on a 1 goal in 23 playoff games stretch. Although Giroux was really good in the playoffs in the first part of his career, the last 3 trips to the playoffs have not been good for the captain from an offensive standpoint.
While the Flyers benefit a ton from all positive things that come from Giroux’s game, right now what they need is offense, and Giroux is more than capable of providing that. Winning faceoffs, playing extremely well defensively is great and all, but offensively Giroux has been invisible. Other than hitting a goal post, he was invisible during the Montreal series and he continues to be so during this Islanders series.
Giroux, as the captain, needs to pick up his offensive game and lead by example. Flyers need the 2010 or 2012 playoffs Giroux, plain and simple. What’s really disturbing to me is that after the Game 4 loss, Giroux seemed to be totally deflated. You can’t have that from your captain.
Giroux needs to get it together, and FAST!
Flyers need this Giroux to take charge of game 5 versus the Islanders, just like he did here in a Game 6 versus the Penguins in 2012:
Paging Travis Konecny
The one that really has me scratching my head is Travis Konecny. Konecny has a reputation of being a disturber and getting under the opponent’s skin, while being good, no, VERY good offensively.
He finished the season first in team goals with 24 of them, but he has completely dried up since the start of the playoffs. Not only is he not scoring, but he hasn’t been creating chances either. Most nights in these playoffs, he’s been completely invisible.
He’s not generating chances, and his skates seem to be on a stand-still mode, which is completely out of character for him. He’s been on the Hayes line or the Couturier line for almost the entire playoffs, so he is playing on the top 2 lines alongside players who can score and/or generate offense, yet Konecny seems to be totally invisible out there. He needs to get out of this funk he is in, in a hurry, as the Flyers have never needed his offensive skills as much as they do right now.
This is the offensive dynamo the Flyers need right now:
After calling out his “top guys” on multiple occasions during these playoffs, it will be interesting to see what, if anything, head coach Alain Vigneault does with Giroux and Konecny in game 5. Giroux has earned a ticket to “let him get out of it on his own” and I feel that’s what Vigneault has given him so far, but for how long can that go on?
As for Konecny, Vigneault needs to get him to stop gripping his stick so tight and he needs to get Konecny moving his legs. While many “experts” didn’t even have the Flyers in the playoffs at the beginning of the season, the Flyers proved during the course of the season that they could be a REALLY good team, with balanced scoring that can come from any of the 4 lines, or even the defense.
If these 2 top guns, in particular, don’t get going as of the very next game, the Flyers will be looking at another “what could have been” season, sooner rather than later.
Featured Image: NHL.com/Bill Meltzer
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