The Flyers managed to pull off a hard fought upset win over the Florida Panthers last night, and they did it in the face of pretty tremendously difficult circumstances. They’re already down Rasmus Ristolainen, Jamie Drysdale, and Nick Seeler due to injuries, and the defense was further depleted on Wednesday, when the Flyers sent Sean Walker off to Colorado. This all amounted to both Ronnie Attard and Adam Ginning, freshly recalled from Lehigh Valley, making their season debuts and being tasked with defending against one of the hottest offenses in the league at the moment.
“I think it just shows that in this organization, it’s the next man up, that’s the mentality that you have to have here,” Ryan Poehling said to the assembled media in Florida after the game, “and I thought the young guys that came up played great”
This pair certainly wasn’t eased into things, but on the whole, they found really positive results, and showed each of their respective games well. In his 17:48 of ice time across all situations, Attard flashed a good bit of transition passing ability, and also made a few nice plays to break up attempted rushes by Florida at the blue line. On top of that, his offensive game also popped distinctly. He didn’t get himself on the scoresheet, but he did put up six individual shot attempts (good for second on the team) and two scoring chances, as he also showed a willingness to activate in the offensive zone, and not just be limited to firing away shots from the point.
And Ginning, in a slightly larger role himself (18:13 of ice time) proved to be a steady defensive presence. He wasn’t flashy, but he took care of things in his own end and didn’t get badly exposed by a Panthers offense that we know can make you look very silly very quickly. He also brought a big physical presence, lest we forget.
All of this, of course, didn’t go unnoticed by their coach. When asked about his impression of their play after the game, John Tortorella was quick to note that “they weren’t afraid, they seemed to feel very comfortable.”
He went on:
“Ginning is a guy who’s going to be in your face, you can see that already, and his game, we knew that about him. Ronnie’s gonna bring some offense, you can see that. I’m [happy]. I’ve gotta look at the tape, but when I watch them, in the game, and they were playing against some pretty good people. They weren’t matched up against their third or fourth lines a lot of the night and I thought they handled themselves really well”
There probably couldn’t be a more difficult debut drawn up for them, and they did just about as well as we might have hoped to see them do. It’s a small sample, to be sure, and the question now turns to how Attard and Ginning build on these performances — because it’s looking like they’ll be sticking around for a little while — but the initial returns on them have definitely been encouraging. They’re doing well to help keep the Flyers’ momentum (and playoff hopes) rolling, and making a strong case for themselves to be seriously in the mix for more permanent roster spots down the line, as a rebuilding club would need. What more could you want?
All stats via Natural Stat Trick.
