Philadelphia Flyers @ Pittsburgh Penguins 3/17/2019: lines, preview, how to watch
It’s a Saint Patrick’s day hockey night in Pittsburgh!
Who: Philadelphia Flyers (34-29-8; 76 points, 6th place in Metropolitan Division) @ Pittsburgh Penguins(39-24-9; 87 points, 3rd place in Metropolitan Division)
When: 7:30 p.m. Eastern time
How to Watch: Nationally televised game on NBC Sports Net
Opponent Track: The Flyers are good at losing and they’ve lost 2 straight games, first Washington beat ‘em up real good 5-2 and then Philly blew a 5-2 lead in spectacular fashion to fall 7-6 to Toronto. And that will about do it for any false hope to make the playoffs.
Pens Refresh: After a 7-1-2 run the Pens were terrible in a Saturday afternoon game against the Blues
Season Series: Philly took the first game on December 1st 4-2. Pittsburgh won the second contest 4-1. Philly took the outdoor game in OT 4-3 on February 23rd. And today will be the last game of the season
Player stats at a glance
-The goalies are just a comedy of errors and too funny to look at.
-The top three usual suspects in Giroux, Voracek and Couturier are having good years. Behind that, not too many else are.
SBN Team Counterpart: Broad Street Hockey
Big story: 16,000
It’s a big day in Flyer history!
Just as a fun reminder, March 17th will be the 16,000th day since the Flyers last won a Stanley Cup. Also: pic.twitter.com/M7C8GqKrXv
— SinceFlyersLastCup (@SinceFlyersCup) February 15, 2019
Years without a playoff win will also increase this year to going-on eight years. Most sites have Philly’s playoff chances now between 1 and 2%.
Who’s hot
—Well, a lot of players individually, believe it or not. Nine players (Giroux, JvR, Voracek, Couturier, Konecny, Sanheim, Patrick, Laughton, Gostisbehere) have at least six points in the last 10 games.
—Voracek has 12 points (4g+8a) in his last six games, and coming off a recent suspension
—van Riemsdyk recorded a hat trick last game against a former team Toronto
Possible lines
Oskar Lindbolm - Sean Couturier - Jakub Voracek
James van Riemsdyk - Nolan Patrick - Claude Giroux
Michael Raffl - Scott Laughton - Travis Konecny
Phil Varone - Corban Knight - Ryan Hartman
Ivan Provorov / Travis Sanheim
Shayne Gostisbehere / Philippe Myers
And now for the Penguins...
Check the game notes, eh bud?
Infographic courtesy of the Penguins
Possible Lines
Jared McCann - Sidney Crosby - Jake Guentzel
Teddy Blueger -Evgeni Malkin - Phil Kessel
Dominik Simon - Nick Bjugstad - Patric Hornqvist
Joseph Blandisi - Matt Cullen- Garrett Wilson
Marcus Pettersson / Erik Gudbranson
Brian Dumoulin / ?
Expected scratches: Juuso Riikola (healthy), Chad Ruhwedel (upper body injury), Bryan Rust (lower body injury), Zach Aston-Reese (hip)
Injured Reserve: Olli Maatta (upper body
-Will the ? be Zach Trotman. Or Kris Letang? Possibly you? Find out soon!
Eye on the Standings
—The Pens loss yesterday didn’t really hurt them (aside from being a missed opportunity) being as Washington lost 6-3 to Tampa and NYI fell 2-1 to the lowly Red Wings.
—With Montreal slumping out of the picture the playoff teams are looking to take shape. To avoid a wild card spot, Pittsburgh needs to stay ahead of Carolina who is now right on their heels two points back but have a game in hand and would have the tiebreaker in ROW, should the Canes win their game in hand.
—Pittsburgh and Carolina plays on Tuesday in what will be the latest “biggest game of the season”.
Key to the game
Pens power play vs Flyers PK
Pittsburgh boasts the league’s third best power play. Philly’s PK is just 26th in the league. Though the Pens’ power play is only 20.0% on home ice (compared to a lethal 33.3% on the road), so they’ll need to buck that today. Scoring goals from the power play will be a key way to win this one.