Sergei Bobrovsky started the first game of the NHL playoffs for the Flyers and actually looked quite good. Then, in the first period of his second start, he gave up three goals and that was that. The rookie was pulled in favor of Brian Boucher, but that certainly wasn’t the end of the Flyers’ carousel.
Bobrovsky wasn’t even dressed after that as Peter Laviolette opted to use Michael Leighton as his backup. Boucher played well, then struggled, which made way for Leighton to first play in relief, then start. Leighton then predictably struggled, which paved the way for Boucher’s return. Then Leighton supposedly went AWOL from the team which meant Bobrovsky returned as the backup. Then Boucher struggled, Bob came on in relief and low and behold we’re back where we started.
Sergei Bobrovsky gets the call in net for game four against the Bruins and Flyers try to stave off elimination and prevent the sweep.
“Bob will start in net for us tonight,” coach Peter Laviolette said. “Brian came in and played really well for us, and came in and pinch hit for Bob early on and played really well for us. But we find ourselves down three here in Boston, and Bob came off the bench a couple times and looked good.”
Of course, the Flyers were in a very similar situation last year facing a 3-0 series deficit against the Bruins and having used a couple different goalies. That time they pulled on an historic comeback to win the series. History would be against them doing it again, but Laviolette says the team’s focus is on just this one game.
“You listen around, everybody has written us off completely already. Our team has won a lot of hockey games, I don’t think it’s unimaginable for us to beat the Boston Bruins in one game. So that’s our objective, we just keep it simple. We have one game to play and we need to win it. We have a lot of confidence in our group that we can do it.”
We’ll find out what happens tonight at 8pm as the teams face off at Boston Garden in game four.