Larry Brooks

Larry Brooks

NHL

Flyers in desperate need of adjustments after Game 1 dud

So maybe Philadelphia coach Craig Berube will think twice the next time before instructing his team to change its game in order to counter Ryan McDonagh, because whatever it was exactly the Flyers tried to do against the Rangers in Thursday’s Game 1 of the first-round playoff series couldn’t have been more ineffectual.

It was 4-1 at the Garden for the Blueshirts, who seized the match when they broke a 1-1 tie midway through the third by scoring twice 47 seconds apart in converting on both ends of a four-minute power play they were granted when Jason Akeson drew blood high-sticking Carl Hagelin.

Brad Richards got the first one and set up Derek Stepan for the second one before adding another assist on Hagelin’s even-strength goal at 15:52. When it was over, No. 19 was asked a question about last year’s playoff nightmare that ended with him in street clothes, a healthy scratch for the final two games of the Boston series.

“I don’t think I need to talk about last year,” Richards, the proud alternate captain, said. “I’ve had a lot of good years.”

No one should jump the gun here. Even as the Rangers filled in one piece of the image of the Stanley Cup that hung from their locker-room grease board, the message was inescapable: One 16th down, but still 15 16ths to go.

The Blueshirts were in control throughout. Of the 35 faceoffs at either end of the ice, 29 were in the Flyers’ defensive zone. And if that number was skewed somewhat by a succession of New York third-period power plays, 21 of the first 26 were in the Philadelphia zone before Richards won the draw that triggered the sequence leading to the tie-breaking goal.

Henrik Lundqvist, beaten on a redirected long one at 7:28 of the first off the stick of Andrew McDonald on the Flyers’ first shot of the night, faced just 14 more altogether and only one in the third period, during which the Blueshirts had a man advantage for 6:03.

The Flyers couldn’t skate with the Rangers. Their obsession with McDonagh — honestly, you’d have thought No. 27 had morphed into No. 4, Bobby Orr, the way Berube game-planned around him by instructing Claude Giroux and his linemates to abandon their rush game and instead play dump-and-crash — reduced their attack to wings and a prayer.

Coaching his first NHL playoff game, Berube likely felt vindicated when Scott Hartnell crushed McDonagh behind the net on a dump-in, took the puck and fed McDonald for the opening goal. Just two minutes later, McDonagh committed an unsightly and unforced turnover inside the line.

But this wasn’t a function of Philadelphia strategy as much as it was of the rust on McDonagh, who was playing his first game since suffering a left shoulder injury on April 1.

“I was not myself,” McDonagh said. “I couldn’t get a good grip on my stick, I couldn’t get my legs under me or find the puck. It was quite a ways since my last game.

“But I got great support from the guys and when I got my feet under me, I was able to be myself again.”

That’s McDonagh, though Berube seems to be under the impression the Rangers’ MVP is Orr. That’s the inference given the instructions he imparted to his club’s top line of Giroux, Hartnell and Jakub Voracek to abandon the style that got them to the dance.

Fred Shero’s Flyers dumped the puck incessantly in Orr’s corner in the 1974 Finals, thus forcing him to turn, retreat and navigate the length of the rink in what became an upset six-game Philadelphia victory over the Bruins.

Shero’s Rangers employed the same strategy against Denis Potvin in the 1979 Cup semifinals in what became an upset six-game victory for the Blueshirts over the Islanders.

But neither time did the strategy signal a dramatic departure in style from those clubs’ approach during the regular season. Insisting that Giroux, who closed with a rush to finish third in the NHL scoring race with 86 points (28-58) in large part because he is so deadly on the rush, give up possession of the puck, not only was a risky bit of business, but also failed in its purpose.

Giroux was all but invisible, other than going down when cross-checked by McDonagh moments after McDonald’s shot eluded Lundqvist. His line accounted for two shots, both from Hartnell.

Playoff series are about adjustments. The Flyers aren’t likely to come with an encore of their Game 1 approach. But who knows? Maybe next game, McDonagh will fly through the air after scoring from in front in overtime.