Three reasons why the Flyers won Game 1 against the Canadiens

The Flyers grabbed right where they left off (after sweeping their seeding games) to open the first official round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs Wednesday night, and hung on to claim a 2-1 victory over the Canadiens.

Philly played her 60 minutes not the best game, but an excellent outing by Carter Hart, along with opportunistic scores and some luck got the Orange and Black 1-0 for in the best of seven sets.

On paper that went into the series, Philadelphia had an advantage. Montreal, although they had their claws in the 16-team Stanley Cup bracket, were the worst team in the bubble, losing nine more games than they won in the regular season (31-31-9). They deserved a place to lie down after the Penguins were drafted in the qualifying match. The Flyers conceded 29 fewer goals in two fewer games – and scored 18 more – back before the season ended in March. Head-to-head, the Flyers won two of three meetings, both in overtime.

Of course, there’s a reason they play the games. Here are three reasons why the Flyers won Game 1 in Toronto:

Start up

The Flyers went 0-for-11 on the man advantage during their three otherwise dominant victories in ‘pool play’, but when they got their first chance in Game 1, they made an early statement.

After half a minute with control of the puck that no doubt Flyers fans at the Wells Fargo Center would have “shoooooot,” Ivan Provorov (of Claude Giroux and Travis Konecny) decided to fire one from just inside the blue line. He was able to push the need through a lot of traffic to get the Flyers early to 1-0.

In the series, the Flyers have a special team advantage that they hope they can exploit, and see if they can do that will be one of the main stories on the ice over the next two weeks.

The goal of the first period was the first for both teams on the power play (the Canadiens would follow with their first PP success in the second).

Heart of a champion

If Carey Price and Carter Hart did not have their respective uniforms on, you would not be able to tell who the 21-year-old was, and which goalkeeper was making his 65th career playoff start.

Hart, who will have a very happy 22nd birthday on Thursday, looked poised, relaxed and completely unintimidated by the situation in which he found himself. Some of the circumstances under which he was able to follow the puck and position himself perfectly were just remarkable. Hart stepped through the game several times making significant savings, and also found himself the recipient of a lot of luck (such as the time a potential 2-on-0 rush ended up disappearing into a Canadian player).

In all, Hart stopped 27 Montreal shots, including an attack in the second period. His first mistake came from a rebound over which he literally had no control, with the Candiens taking advantage of a man.

A little more luck would come later in the third period than a potential game-bound goal ricocheted from the crossbar.

Pistol

The Flyers allowed the least protests defensively in the regular season and the Canadiens finished second in the NHL in shots that were made. One of those stats would have to give way Wednesday night and the Flyers’ defense could keep the Habs below their 31 shots per average (they 31-28 out-shoot).

The Canadiens were dynamic in the second, but could not repeat that effort in the other periods of the game. The shots on goal distribution:

The Battle of the Scots was just one facet of a game that saw no shortage of action, and of terrible mistakes by the Flyers. The team’s 14 giveaways provided the Habs with too many chances and the defense had allowed more than a dozen chances for scoring in the first 30 minutes of scoring time. The Canadiens looked faster and often a little more feisty, but the Flyers played with patience and confidence and grabbed their spots.

Also, how in the world has Price made these savings?

The breaks eventually went the way of the Flyers. Not long after Montreal came on board with Shea Weber’s goal from Shea Weber, Joel Farabee said “not so fast” because he took advantage of Price who was out of position just 16 seconds later and scored on a deflection to put Philly back in the top 2- 1 (assisted by Travis Sanheim).