Sidney Crosby & Crew celebrate their 1st round victory, leaving Flyers fans wondering what their team needs to do to get to the next level

For the third time in the last four seasons the Flyers have failed to advance past the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  And for the second year in a row, they’ve been ousted by the Pittsburgh Penguins.  All the pieces seem to be in place for the Flyers - and to be fair, they were much more competitive against the  Pens this season than last - but they’re golfing now and the Pens are moving on.  What does this team need to get over the hump?

Last year, coming off of a season in which they had a franchise-worst and NHL-worst record, the Flyers had a miraculous turnaround; making it all the way to the Conference Finals.  They were eliminated by Pittsburgh, but the future looked bright.  In many ways, this year’s edition of the Flyers was better but they couldn’t extend their season into May.

Last year’s team didn’t have Simon Gagne for most of the year, and all of the playoffs.  Not only was he back this year, but the offense also got a boost from rookie sensation Claude Giroux.  The defense, which proved to be a little too slow last season, was overhauled a bit.  Out were Jason Smith and Derian Hatcher as guys like Braydon Coburn, Ryan Parent, and Randy Jones joined Kimmo Timonen as quick puck-moving defenseman.  Jeff Carter took a giant leap foward; scoring 46 goals (Second in the league to Alex Ovechkin).  As a team the Flyers had four 30-goal scorers and six 25-goal scorers; both tops in the league.  And Mike Richards proved to be a great on-ice leader in his first season wearing the captain’s “C” on his sweater.  All of that, and here I am writing this article about six weeks before I wanted/expected to.

I could give a bunch of excuses why the Flyers lost their first round series with Pittsburgh, but that’s exactly what they’d be: excuses.  And yes, the Flyers did outplay the Pens for large portions of the series.  From the halfway point of game 2 all the way to the halfway point of game 6, the Flyers were the better team.  But, during that stretch, they only managed two wins.  Sure, the penalties always favor the Penguins’ Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby, but there really weren’t any critical calls, or no-calls, that stole a game from one team or the other.  The reason the Flyers lost that series, while somewhat mysterious considering everything mentioned above, was totally consistent with the regular season.

All season the Flyers failed to take advantage of any opportunity to make life easier on themselves.  And that characteristic was especially noticeable the final month of the season, and eventually culminated with their early playoff exit.  Holding onto the number four seed for a few weeks in March, the Flyers had a very easy schedule in April.  It seemed a sure thing they’d secure the fourth seed.  Then the New Jersey Devils started to tailspin.  Given those two facts, the Flyers could have very realistically taken the division title from the Devils.  The Flyers struggled with teams below them in the standings, and all of the sudden, not only did the division title become out of reach, their grip on the fourth seed (and the home ice advantage that comes with it) slipped.

Despite all of it, they entered the final day of the regular season needing only one point against the New York Rangers (who had locked up the seventh seed the day before) to secure home ice advantage in the first round.  The Flyers took a one goal lead into the third period, where the Rangers promptly erased it and eventually took the lead back and won the game, dropping the Flyers out of the fourth seed.

It then took the Flyers a game and a half to show up to the playoffs, and it put them in a 2-0 hole.  All season, the Flyers had the attitude that they could just flip a switch whenever they wanted, and start playing good hockey.  And a lot of times, they were right.  They were a great third period team, and came from behind many times.  But the problem with that strategy is that you lose all margin for error.  Many people will point to the critical game four that Marc-Andre Fleury stole for the Pens as a “tough break” and turning point in the series.  It certainly was a turning point (The series went 3-1 instead of 2-2; a world of difference), but the Flyers left themselves vulnerable to that exact situation.  If they play with the same intensity they played with in the second half of the series, maybe they leave Pittsburgh with a 1-1 split and are in a position to handle a tough loss like game four.

All the talent is there, with nearly all their key contributors in their primes or entering their prime.  They have good leadership, and they seem to have good chemistry.  And I always thought they had good coaching.  But given their recent struggles to get to the next level, there has to be room for improvement.  And that is where this team stands: they like all the pieces they have, but the puzzle just isn’t matching the picture on the front of the box.

There is only one change I can think of to improve this team:  they need an attitude adjustment.  They need to play with more intensity more often.  Every team goes through slumps, both during a season and within games.  But the Flyers have had too many of those slumps, and those slumps have lasted too long.  There is no way to point to one particular player or even one particular aspect of the team as the reason for the lack of success.  All I can hope is that this season serves as a lesson that their attitude and intensity needs to change for next season.