NHL Preview Roundup: Philadelphia Flyers vs. Ottawa Senators, Pittsburgh Penguins vs. Minnesota Wild
Philadelphia Flyers vs. Ottawa Senators (7:30 p.m. ET)
This will be the first time that Philadelphia Flyers will be going against the Ottawa Senators in the 2011-2012 National Hockey League (NHL) regular season, and will meet for a total of four contests throughout.
Ottawa has seen better starts to a new season as they have not been able to win a single contest thus far in the season, except for one against the Minnesota Wild in a shootout.
Philadelphia Flyers on the other hand have lost only one of their previous four and are looking to put that loss behind them and move on to, eyeing the Stanley Cup next year since they crossed all limits during the 2011 offseason in order to make their team
capable of doing so by eliminating their weak spots.
A problem for the Flyers so far would be the number of penalties they give off, enabling the opposition to score on power play opportunities. They stand fourth in the league for the most minutes in penalty time with 76, which could in the long run come back
to haunt them if they do not improve now.
"When that many penalties happen throughout the course of a game it really takes the flow out of your bench", Philadelphia head coach, Peter Laviolette, told the Flyers' official website. "Seems like one group gets exhausted, and then the other group gets
exhausted".
Coming out of a monumental, 7-1, loss against Colorado Avalanche on Thursday, Ottawa managed to control the number of goals made against them but still loss against Washington Capitals, this time by 2-1.
Keeping their defences up like they did against Washington, Senators just might be able to take advantage of Philadelphia’s goalie, Ilya Bryzgalov, seeing the number of goals he allows on average per match (2).
The matchup between Ottawa Senators and Philadelphia Flyers just might not be what most people expect it to be, making it all that more exciting.
Pittsburgh Penguins vs. Minnesota Wild (7:30 p.m. ET)
Pittsburgh Penguins and Minnesota Wild will be meeting each other for the first time as well, but for them, it will also be the last time they will see each other before the playoffs since they are scheduled to play only once.
In their last showdown earlier in January of this year, Minnesota rocked the Penguins home stadium by winning, 4-0, and showed that they are not a team to be messed with. The interesting part of that is Minnesota just might be able to do it again since Pittsburgh
is missing both of its top players, Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby, just like before.
Even though Pittsburgh might be missing a couple of top-notch shooters, new Minnesota Wild coach, Mike Yeo, is not underestimating them in any way.
"They have a lot of good players, they have a good recipe for winning", Yeo told the Wild's official website about their upcoming matchup against Pittsburgh Penguins. "They have a very good understanding of what their game is and how it should work out".
Pittsburgh is certainly in a vulnerable position to either make it or break it since losing three straight, most recently against Winnipeg Jets. They will be looking to take down Minnesota Wild, not only to rewrite history but also to snap their own losing
streak.
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