Flyers Light Up Price To Take 2-1 Lead

Recapping NHL Eastern Conference Semifianls Game 3 between Montreal & Philadelphia

Game #3 – Philadelphia Flyers 3 – Montreal Canadiens 2

The Canadiens cannot play much better, but their problem is, neither can Martin Biron. Philadelphia had three scoring chances in the entire game and happened to finish all of them through Carey Price. Montreal’s 20-year old goalie looked shaky for the second straight game, only making 9 saves on 12 shots, and was pulled after the second period. All Montreal can do is laugh and move on to Game #4 since their goalie just happens to get cold, while your opponents' goalie gets hot.

How else can you explain out-shooting the Flyers 34-14 and still lose? The first two periods showed how dominating the Habs could be, until Philly scored three goals in an 11 minute span in the second. Scottie Upshall and R.J. Umberger have been killers against the Habs, both scoring one goal during that time, while Mike Richards slapped a shorthanded marker as well.

Taking a 3-0 lead into the third period, the Flyers could just sit back and enjoy the ride of the Biron-mobile for 20 minutes. This was true until Derian Hatcher made a typical knuckle-head move, by checking Francis Bouillon from behind into the boards. If you missed it, you likely heard about it. Hatcher’s stupidity notched him a 5 minute boarding penalty and a 10 minute game misconduct, giving Montreal an opportunity to back in this game.

Tomas Plekanec finally solved Biron at the 7:29 mark of the third period and Saku Koivu both scored one minute later. Just like that folks, we had a game in our hands. Montreal’s back-up goalie, Jaroslav Halak faced only 2 shots in the third period while Biron was punished with 17. Still, the Habs come out with a loss.

I cannot imagine the frustration the Canadiens are feeling knowing that it is not their goalie controlling this series. Game #3 saw 10 Montreal players finish with a negative plus/minus, while not one Philadelphia player did.

Here are the key factors in this series as stated in our Eastern Conference Semifinals preview:

• The Price/Biron match-up is not even close. Price has been a second round playoff flop.

• Montreal’s PP did score twice in the final frame, but also allowed Richards to put one in shorthanded. No consistency at all with the Canadiens special teams.

• Overall, Briere has not been a factor in this series at all. Coach Carbonneau has done well to shut him down after his first round success.

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I want to see if Biron can continue this ridiculous play of making 30+ saves every game. He has to get tired eventually? Right?

Philadelphia leads series 2-1.

By Kevin Chaves
ProHockey-fans.com Staff Writer

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> Game #1 & 2 recap of Philadelphia vs. Montreal

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