WITH A LITTLE more than 15 minutes remaining last night - and just 7 seconds having ticked off a Minnesota penalty kill - Claude Giroux carefully cradled the puck on his stick atop the circle to the right of Wild goalie Josh Harding.
Giroux waited and waited, stickhandling from side to side. Jaromir Jagr and Wayne Simmonds were parked in front of Harding.
Without any other viable option, Giroux pulled back and took a wrist shot that Harding caught rather easily.
Frustrated, Giroux stood there for a few seconds with his stick resting on top of his helmet. It was a shot that, just a few weeks ago, would have found the twine.
That's the way things have been going for Giroux since he returned from his concussion on Dec. 21 with a four-point outburst. Last night, Giroux contributed an assist (his 200th career NHL point) but he has scored just one goal in his last 11 games.
His linemate, Jaromir Jagr, is 11th on the all-time goals list with 658. And Jagr once went 18 games without a goal.
"No matter how good you are, you are going to go through this," Jagr said yesterday. "When you're not the top guy, and you don't score for 10 games, no one really cares about that or notices.
"I don't worry about him and no one should worry about him."
It's not as if Giroux has not played well over the last 11 games. His work ethic and competitiveness for every loose puck is as noticeable now as it was when he was atop the NHL's scoring leaders. And at 50 points, still is among the league leaders, and has six assists in this 11-game span.
It is his frustration, though, that coach Peter Laviolette said he is "trying to talk him out of."
"There's the ebb and flow of things," Laviolette said on Saturday in Nashville. "It'd be great if teams and players only experienced great things through the course of 82 games, but that's not the way life is."
Giroux said it was not about his personal stats, but rather about knowing that he can play better. The Flyers are 6-5-0 in this 11-game stretch, and Giroux isn't the one to blame. It has largely been the Flyers' longest run of sloppy hockey since the season started in October.
Still, they were able to stay afloat with the help of secondary scoring.
"The good thing about this team is that when our line doesn't score, we keep winning," Jagr said. "The third and fourth line score. That's a great sign."
Yes, Jagr is right that Giroux' slump has been cushioned by the emergence of players like Sean Couturier, who has scored in five straight games, and Simmonds. But Giroux has skated with the extra weight of a target on his back, since opponents know the Flyers are infinitely more dangerous with him finding the back of the net on a near-nightly basis.
"He tasted it," Jagr said. "If someone would have told him, after the first half of the season, that he would lead the league, he would have taken it. Hopefully we can get back on track soon."
After skating in 20 of 29 contests away from the Wells Fargo Center, the Flyers began a stretch of 11 of 15 games in South Philly.
They need to board a plane just twice in the next month - for trips to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Detroit - and have quick trips to North Jersey and New York City.
In the meantime, the Flyers - the league's best road team with a point earned in 18 of 25 games - look to improve on their 11-6-2 home mark.
"For some reason, we haven't had the chance to play consecutive games at home," Danny Briere said. "They're usually at the end of a long road trip. Maybe that's why. The first game at home is always usually a little tougher. I don't know how to explain it.
"We want to make sure Philadelphia is one of the toughest buildings to play in. We want to make that happen again, to make sure teams don't think they have a free pass."
"It's just like a goal-scorer. When the goals are not coming, sometimes you need that fluky one to get going again. 'Bryz' just needs to find that first win to hopefully get him rolling again."
- Danny Briere, on Ilya Bryzgalov's recent rough run in net, after streaks of 3-0-1, 5-0-1 and 6-0-0.
