Philadelphia Flyers: Why the Young Team Will Fall Apart Down the Stretch

It’s getting to be that time of year in Philadelphia Flyers hockey.

No, not the beginning of ridiculous pipe-dream trade scenarios that occur before the trade deadline. And not the speculation about who would make for the easiest matchup in the first round of the playoffs.

It’s the time of year when a team that has been so successful and strong all season long plants the seed of doubt in the mind of its fans.

The Flyers have not strung together back-to-back wins since January 10^th and 12^th, and since then the team is a mere 6-7-3 in 16 games—not the kind of numbers that turn a team into a playoff contender.

At the beginning of the season, one of the most pressing questions about the Flyers was whether or not their youthful offensive corps could carry the burden left by departed players like Jeff Carter, Mike Richards and Ville Leino. The surprisingly successful group of youngsters that earned starting roles wound up as a part of one of the league’s most potent offenses, and seemed to put those concerns to rest.

Now, with the team struggling and the playoffs fast-approaching, a new question about the team’s inexperienced players has arisen: Will this team fall apart down the stretch?

Let’s take a look at why Flyers fans find themselves concerned about the team heading into the home stretch.

They Will Be Facing More Experienced Teams

Throughout most of the season, the Flyers rookies have played well enough to satisfy the fanbase. However, no matter how well this group gels, you simply cannot put a price on experience.

At the moment, the Eastern Conference’s three most dangerous teams appear to be: the New York Rangers, who have been consistently dominant for most of the season; the Boston Bruins, who have cooled off recently but still possess all the pieces for a big playoff run; and the Pittsburgh Penguins, who appear to be putting their season back together and riding an Evgeni Malkin surge to a playoff spot.

All three of these teams are dangerous because they have what the Flyers lack: experience.

The Rangers have a core group of players who have come up through the New York system for years and are familiar with one another. In addition, the team has veterans like Marian Gaborik and Brad Richards, both of whom have the potential to be playoff difference-makers. Richards won the Stanley Cup and Conn Smythe Trophy as a member of the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2004.

The Bruins are essentially the same squad that won the Stanley Cup last season, and many of Pittsburgh’s players have come up through the franchise’s system together. A number of those players already won a Stanley Cup in 2009.

For all the success of Matt Read, Brayden Schenn, Sean Couturier and other young players, it’s difficult to put a price on something like time. And this group of Flyers simply hasn’t had enough time to reach its full potential.

Defense Wins Championships

Many of the Flyers youngsters play in offensive positions, but the mantra in sports is that defense wins championships.

For all the goal scoring this team is capable of, they will inevitably be lighting the lamp less and less as the playoffs approach and opponents buckle down on the defensive front. This will require the Flyers to play tight games, and the responsibilities of the rookies will expand.

While Sean Couturier and Matt Read have shown great abilities on the penalty kill, it remains to be seen whether or not they can shut down opponents when matched up against teams with balanced scoring and more offensive threats.

As the game evolves and the challenges become greater, the Flyers will need to keep up with opponents, and for a team who has relied upon its scoring to cover up its problems on defense, it is possible that it will all come crashing down when the going gets tough.

Concerns About Versatility

Every hockey team deals with injuries in the latter portion of the year, and when this happens, a player has the opportunity to step up and make a name for himself.

Unfortunately for the Flyers, most of their young players have not demonstrated that they have the ability to fill larger roles than the ones Peter Laviolette has already demanded.

Both Matt Read and Sean Couturier had opportunities to expand their games, with Read filling in for Danny Briere as the second-line center and Couturier being moved up to a top-six forward spot on a few occasions, but neither proved that they could thrive out of their comfort zone.

Likewise, James van Riemsdyk has actually seen himself removed from the top six and has struggled most of the season in any role.

Come playoff time, the demand for versatile forwards becomes great, and the Flyers have not yet proven that they are capable of filling all the roles that a championship team needs.

The Goaltending Is Simply Deflating

Team sports can be a funny thing, because no one player can carry the entire squad, no matter how good he or she is.

And yet, for the Philadelphia Flyers, it seems like one player is capable of bringing the whole team down.

Anyone who has watched even a handful of Flyers games since the Winter Classic has probably seen more than one occasion where some shoddy goaltending brought the team down, and in many cases, cost the team a win (case in point: Saturday’s matchup with the Penguins).

For the Flyers, particularly the young players, the process of playing a solid individual game only to have it marred by pathetic goaltending can be extremely mentally draining.

Ilya Bryzgalov and Sergei Bobrovsky are doing nothing to inspire confidence in the five players in front of them at all times. The lack of consistency in net requires the forwards and defensemen to be mentally tougher and tougher every single game after every single mishap, and there is only so much a young team can take.

It is not hyperbolic in the slightest to conjecture that bad goaltending will bring down this group of newcomers, and it needs to improve for this team to function as a unit.

Dealing with Turmoil

Officially or unofficially, the Flyers are undoubtedly in panic mode. The team is hitting a slump, its expensive goaltending is producing nothing but frustrations and the franchise finds itself in trade talks around the league.

There is no shortage of names being thrown around by fans and the media as they speculate solutions for struggling team, from Ilya Bryzgalov to Sergei Bobrovsky to Matt Carle. But, as with any team trying to be a buyer at the trade deadline, prospective suitors seemed most focused on the younger players.

James van Riemsdyk, Brayden Schenn and Sean Couturier all find themselves the subject of trade chatter, regardless of whether or not these theories have any basis. Being bombarded with questions about rumors and not knowing whether or not they’ll call Philadelphia home tomorrow can wear on the psyche of a player who is still breaking into the NHL.

It is very possible that all these trade rumors are for naught, and the young corps of players will remain the same for next year. At that time, they will be a little more hardened, a little more experienced and a little more well-equipped to deal with the Philly media blitz.

But this year, they are simply too young.

Hockey always takes a physical toll by the time February and March roll around, but in Philadelphia, it takes a mental and emotional toll as well.