Such was the Penguins' domination of the first 30-odd minutes of the game. Such was the Flyers' inability to sustain anything for way too long. It was a thorough beating for a goodly period of time. It was as if the Flyers forgot what playoff hockey is all about - the intensity, the emotion, all of it.
"It took a while to get our legs going, it looked like," Biron said. "The second period was sluggish on both sides. Having to play catch-up hockey against that team is not an easy thing. We got some bad bounces go against us. Usually when you get a bad bounce like that, it's because
you're not creating the good bounces. I think we've got to go out there hungry to create good bounces, to create good things."
Biron does not get a total pass here. In the National Hockey League in the springtime, goaltenders never do. It is one of the beauties of the sport that one player can so distort the outcome. These are the Stanley Cup playoffs, and each goaltender is handed a lottery ticket on his way onto the ice as he passes through the gate. If he plays well enough, he cashes. Marty didn't cash.
If you run through them, Biron probably would have played the first goal, a Sidney Crosby power play goal, the exact same way - even if he did end up inadvertently knocking the rebound into the net himself.
The second goal, off a three-on-one, was an offspeed pitch from Tyler Kennedy that Biron didn't handle - not a hanging offense, but, well . . .
The third goal was just bizarre - a Mike Knuble attempt to bang the puck safely behind the net that ended up caroming off the back boards, then off the side of the net, to a wide-open Evgeni Malkin.
"A bad dream," Knuble called it.
And the fourth goal deflected off the Flyers' Claude Giroux in front.
Now, four is a big number at this time of year. But a fair reading of the evening can recognize the extenuating circumstances.
