Penguins/Flyers Game 4 Recap: Crosby and Pens humiliate lifeless Philly team, city

Lineups

Welcome to the NHL playoffs, Dominik Simon with a choice opportunity to take the spot of Patric Hornqvist (upper body injury).

The Flyers have a lineup change too since big dumb idiot Radko Gudas hit his own player in practice yesterday. Sean Couturier is out so now presumably Letang and Malkin will have to punch themselves in the face following whistles for no real reason.

1st period

The Flyers do the one thing they can’t do just 3 minutes in. Matt Read takes a holding penalty in the neutral zone. Guess what happens? Phil to Sid to Geno, that’s what.

Later Philly finally gets a little push but no goal. Evgeni Malkin passes to Phil Kessel and yeah, that’s a goal. 2-0 Pens.

Then Travis Konecny gets called for cleaning out a player well away from the puck, he pulls an incredulous look but sorry cuzzo that’s interference. Amazingly the Flyers somehow kill the penalty off without conceding a goal. Konecny is sprung from the penalty box and given a great pass for a clear breakaway and he....can’t score because he’s shooting at Matt Murray and not Brian Elliott.

Olli Maatta clears the puck over the glass for a penalty.

Just seconds later Wayne Simmonds slashes a stick out of a Pens player hands from slashing. He argues and can’t believe it either. Do they not have copies of the rulebook over there or what?

Anyways period is over. The idiocy and lack of skill of the Flyers combined with the boorishness of their fans has made this extremely dismissible. Is this series over yet? 2-0 Pens, shots 11-10 Pittsburgh.

2nd period

The penalties cycle through, no one scores. Tom Kuhnhackl grabs a player and gets a power play for the Flyers but the Pens do a good job keeping Philly from getting setup and nothing comes of it.

Pittsburgh keeps up the pressure and the gift that keeps on giving, Elliott, coughs another goal up. Great shot by Kris Letang and it goes post and in but Elliott just offers no resistance again. No idea what Andrew MacDonald is doing here. 3-0.

The Flyers finally notice that maybe the goaltending is an issue and pull Elliott for the perpetually injured Michal Neuvirth who is in between owies at the moment.

Meanwhile as the 2nd period gets to the halfway point, the Flyers get their first shot on goal of the period. Are they just phoning it in now or what?

Yeah, it seems so. The whole team falls asleep and Neuvirth looks right. Sadly for him Jake Guentzel passed the puck to Neuvy’s left and Crosby has the puck and a goalie who doesn’t know where it is. Do I even have to finish this thought? Captain. 4-0.

This is the highest level of the season, you guys, only the best of the best can compete. For some reason they also invited Shayne Gotisbehere.

Malkin butt ends Konecny in a nasty looking way, gets a double minor for it and deserves it too. Wasn’t intentional as he was jousting for the puck with another player but you have to be in control of your stick at all times.

Pittsburgh kills off the rest of the period. Shots 11-7 in the 2nd for the Pens, score 2-0 in the period, 4-0 overall.

3rd period

Zzzz. Not much of note happens. The Flyers can’t even put together an effort for pride. The fans barely seem awake. It’s all almost over now.

Riley Sheahan gets behind the defense and scores. 5-0.

Trash boy Matt Read swings a stick at the back of Derick Brassard’s knee in the closing minutes. The Pens can’t even be bothered to send their stars out for the power play, probably for the best in case they try to goon it up.

Game 4 a resounding success. Pens are 1 game away from flushing the Flyers for another year. Can’t come soon enough.

Some Thoughts

• Penguins now are up a total of a whopping 20-3 margin on Philly ice this year. Also not shocking, they’ve won every game in Philadelphia this season, scoring a tidy 5 goals in each of the four games.
• Pens improve to 14-1 in the playoffs all-time when both Malkin and Crosby score a goal.
• Crosby passes Mario Lemieux as #1 all-time in Pittsburgh playoff scoring. Lemieux played a lot less games though, as I’m sure Sid will be the first to point out, but #66 is now in the rear-view mirror for possibly the 2nd major category. (The first being the 3-2 count of Stanley Cups won as a player)
• If this game even counts as a playoff game. Good grief the Flyers are not a very good team. They turn the puck over constantly, have poor goaltending, bad coaching and they’re injuring each other on the off days. Maybe they would have been better off going the dignified route and letting the upstart Florida Panthers make the playoffs.
• Liked the night from Conor Sheary. Nothing flashy (though he did have 4 SOG in just about 12 minutes of TOI) but he looks good when he’s moving fast, keeping those legs going and trying hard. He was trying hard tonight. More of that, please.
• Dominik Simon looked pretty good. First game since the sixth grade picnic it seems, but he was fine. Not flashy but a pretty effective player.
• Guentzel quietly has 7 points in the 4 games on the series. Playing with Crosby helps, but that pass Jake the snake had to him below the goal line for Crosby’s goal was a thing of beauty.
• Matt Murray with his 2nd shutout of the series and 6th career playoff shutout in just his 36th game. For perspective, he’s only got 10 playoff losses! Absurd stuff there, he probably wishes they could play Philly all the way to the Cup too. Other than the Konecny breakaeay aided by leaving the penalty box, I don’t think he really had one tough save to make all night. Still made 26 of ‘em on the night though.
• Per our bud Jesse Marshall, the Flyers have used 3 different goalies this series. Sid has scored on all of them. His thorough domination of this franchise brings a smile to any face.

Well, one more game to go, I guess. Hopefully the Flyers have accepted the inevitability of their fate and will phone it in again and give an easy passage to the 2nd round for the champs.