Morning Player Notes in the Playoffs (Apr 19)

Well, that was embarrassing. Between the Flyers play on the ice and the Flyers fans showing their displeasure by throwing their giveaways onto the ice, it was a very poor way to celebrate the life of the team's founder and long-time owner. The Flyers drop Game 3, 6-1, to the Capitals and they now sit in a huge hole, down 3-0 in the series.

The Capitals pummeled the Flyers with five power play goals and it was Alex Ovechkin making the most of it for the pool, coming away with 4 points, including the eventual game-winner in the 2nd period.  John Carlson, Nicklas Backstrom, Justin Williams, T.J. Oshie and Braden Holtby all came away with multiple points in this one.

When the penalties started to roll in the 3rd period, it became a pretty ugly game and this may set the tone for Game 4, if the Flyers know that they are completely outmatched in this series.  This series had the largest difference in pool picks, as the Capitals owned a 145-13 difference and it has played out as such.

File this one under digging deep for a result.  Down 2-0 in the series and quickly down 2-0 in the 1st period, the Minnesota Wild could have easily rolled over in this one and watch this series fall out of reach, but they really pulled that game out of the fire and saved their series. scoring four straight goals for a 4-2 lead and ended up with a 5-3 final.  An absolutely gutsy performance, quickly making this into a series.

The Wild were tied with the Flyers for the least amount of selections, with 13, so the impact in the pool is very limited.  Jason Pominville, taken twice, had a 3-point night in the pool, while Nino Niederreiter, taken once, had a couple of assists as well.

The Stars thought they were in good, when Patrick Sharp, taken 18 times, open the scoring 26 seconds in and added another, four minutes later, but that just wasn't the case on the evening.

As expected, Tyler Seguin didn't play in this one for the Stars, nor did defenseman Kris Russell, both are considered day-to-day with a recurrence of an Achilles injury and illness, respectively.

Like clockwork, Game 3 between the Los Angeles Kings and San Jose Sharks went into overtime, the fourth straight series to have this happen between the two teams, but unlike the first three, it was the Kings taking the overtime win, as Tanner Pearson scored under four minutes into the extra frame for the 2-1 win.

The Kings were in desperate need of this win, as they didn't want to go down 3-0 to the Sharks, because it is already bad enough that they have to win away from home, in order to even up the series.  Jonathan Quick made 29 saves for his first win of the playoffs and now we have ourselves a series in this one as well.

This one will continue on Wednesday night and it should be an excellent game.