Oh and 2 is not the way the Flyers wanted to begin the season and yet it’s become a three-year burden for them.
Thursday’s 6-4 loss to the Devils is shocking when you consider how much better the Flyers were all-around against Boston the night before.
“It’s always not the start we want,” team captain Claude Giroux said. “We have a lot of work to do, we know that. We played a lot of good minutes the way we wanted ... [but] a lot of mistakes that we’re going to look over and that’s how we’re going to get better.”
Last year’s team began 1-7 and saw coach Peter Laviolette fired after the 0-3 start.
“Well, it’s two different seasons,” Vinny Lecavalier said. “We don’t want to bring back last year, last year was last year, and it’s a new year. I still think we played some pretty good hockey, and we need to keep going.
“I think we need to clean a couple things, probably like every team in the beginning of the year like that. I think we did a lot of good things, and we've got to move on.”
The Canadiens visit Wells Fargo Center on Saturday and are 2-0, with both wins coming on the road.
"They got a good team," Wayne Simmonds said. "They're a solid team. They had a great showing last year in the regular season and playoffs. We have to be mentally prepared, as well as physically, for a battle."
The theme coming out of the Devils’ loss was the overall lack of five-man defense, although the Flyers’ blue line itself has miles to go and will be even more challenged without Braydon Coburn for the foreseeable future.
Coburn is on crutches but general manager Ron Hextall said his injury might not be as bad as the club thought (see story).
“He plays a lot of minutes,” Giroux said of Coburn. “He’s usually the [defenseman] that plays the most minutes. We have to move on, and it’s a good chance for other [defensemen] to step up.
“It’s more pressure for us to play [team] defense. I think [for the] forwards, we have to play better defense. We have to protect our net better and play better in front of Mase [Steve Mason]. The goals that went in on Mase, they were bounces that we got against us last year. It’s frustrating.”
Simmonds, who scored two goals just minutes apart in the loss, said the goals are going to be there from the Flyers' side. It’s goal prevention that has to get better.
“It is obviously a fill-in by committee,” Simmonds said, referring specifically to Coburn’s absence. “I don’t think we are going to have a problem scoring. I just think we have to work together as a five-man unit to help play defense and we will be fine.”
The schedule only gets harder for the Flyers. Montreal comes in Saturday night. It seems absurd to call this a must-win, but given the schedule ahead, it certainly qualifies.
“You can’t let it happen again,” Mason said about starting 0-3. “But at the same time, that’s last year, you forget about those things and you just move forward. Does it suck that we are 0-2? Yeah, it sucks, but we have a big opportunity to get back in it this weekend.”
Multi-points
Simmonds' three-point night was his eighth three-plus point game and his 14th career multi-point game.
Shots
Giroux had a team-high seven shots with a goal and an assist. He had two games last season with seven shots. Overall, the Flyers' 39 shots is the most they have had against New Jersey since firing 41 against the Devils on Feb. 4, 2012, a game they also lost by the same 6-4 score. Their all-time record against New Jersey when recording 39 or more shots is just 2-4-3-1.