For Flyers, Improved Special Teams Play Key to Pittsburgh Series

By Mike Witmer, Sports Talk Philly staff writer 

It is an understatement to say some of the Philadelphia Flyers special teams had a poor season, mainly on the penalty kill.

While it is hard to imagine a scenario where the Flyers take no penalties during the series against the Pittsburgh Penguins, their penalty kill is going to have to come through for them.

After finishing the season 29th in the league on the penalty kill with a 75.8 penalty kill percentage, this could be where the Penguins hurt the Flyers most. The Penguins had the league's best power play this season.

Even when looking at the season series between these two teams, the Penguins went 5-for-13 on the power play over four games, a 38 percent success rate. In their previous two games in March, Pittsburgh was 2-for-6, a 33 percent success rate.

Discipline will be key for the Flyers to keep the series even. The talent the Penguins have can be lethal and the Flyers will have to put their slumping penalty kill season behind them and start to work on improving it, as it could win or lose them the series.

As for the power play, the Flyers struggled midway through the season and thus ended up in the middle of the pack for power play success, 15th in the league with a 20.7 power play percentage. The Penguins ended up being 17th in the league on the penalty kill with an even 80 percent penalty kill success rate.

Again, when looking at the season series between the two, the Flyers were 2-for-16 on the power play in the four games against the Penguins, a 12.5 percent success rate.

This could be another area the Flyers can look to get some more improvement, and if the last couple games of the season have been an indication of anything, it looks like Nolan Patrick will take Wayne Simmonds' spot as a net-front presence on the first unit. This switch has worked for the team so far, scoring in both games when it was called upon.

Both the power play and penalty kill need improved play for the Flyers to succeed in the first round. The penalty kill will have to come through in the clutch when called upon, and the power play needs to keep going with the success it made at the end of the season.

It is the Stanley Cup Playoffs after all and anything is possible. Both special teams could end up performing well for the Flyers and if they can build off the dominant win over the Rangers and go into this series with a similar mindset, they could even possibly take down the Penguins.