The third round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs has come and gone. There were three former Philadelphia Flyers who advanced to the Stanley Cup Semifinals, but only ones that played extensive minutes or had impacts for their teams would be Erik Gustafsson and Luke Schenn.
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare (Colorado) and Petr Mrazek (Carolina) were eliminated in the second round. While Braydon Coburn (New York) advanced, he did not play at all and still has yet to appear in a postseason contest for the Islanders, so he will not be on this list.
ERIK GUSTAFSSON – MONTREAL CANADIENS
If you had the Montreal Canadiens going all the way to the final four and Gustafsson being one of the two former Flyers in the group that’d be playing this much this late in the year, I’d really appreciate if you could give me tomorrow’s lottery numbers too.
The Canadiens swept the Winnipeg Jets in the second round to advance to round three for the first time since 2013. Gustafsson racked up a goal and an assist in the series to help Montreal advance to the Stanley Cup Semifinals to take on the Vegas Golden Knights.
Gustafsson appeared in all six games of the Semifinals against the Golden Knights, but did not record a single point. The Canadiens’ storybook playoff run continued on as they upset the heavily favored Golden Knights on an overtime winner from Artturi Lehkonen to advance to their first Stanley Cup Final since 1993.
Gustafsson recorded two blocked shots, one hit, one shot on goal and a +2 rating to accompany his lowly 8:55 of ice time per game in the series.
LUKE SCHENN – TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING
Schenn has been in an out of head coach Jon Cooper’s lineup this postseason, only appearing in 8 of Tampa Bay’s 17 games this postseason, but the former Flyer of 213 games was impactful in the Lightning’s third round matchup against the New York Islanders. The Lightning were able to hold off the Islanders in seven games to make their second consecutive trip to the Stanley Cup Final.
This was a rematch of last year’s Eastern Conference Finals, a series in which the Lightning won in six games en route to their second Stanley Cup and first in 16 years. Last year’s series between the clubs was the last time that Schenn chalked up a point in the postseason until Game 5 of this year’s matchup.
Schenn only played in three games in Tampa Bay’s prior series against the Carolina Hurricanes, registering no points and only managed a time-on-ice average of 9:58 in the series. While he only played in two games against the Islanders, he did manage to finally find the scoresheet.
Schenn blasted home a goal for his first point of the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs in the Lightning’s 8-0 rout of the Islanders in Game 5, netting the eighth and final Tampa Bay goal on a shot from the right point that evaded New York netminder Ilya Sorokin after a lucky bounce off of Islanders’ defenseman Ryan Pulock. It was his first playoff point since Game 5 of last year’s series against the Islanders, and his first playoff goal since Game 4 of the 2016 Western Conference Quarterfinals when Schenn was playing for the Los Angeles Kings.
Schenn finished the series with one goal, three shots on goal, eight hits, and two blocked shots while averaging 13:08 of ice time in his two appearances in the series, each coming in Game 5 and Game 6.
So the 2021 edition of the Stanley Cup Final will feature two former Flyers defensemen as Erik Gustafsson’s Canadiens will take on Luke Schenn’s Lightning as Tampa Bay looks to repeat as champions of the NHL, while Montreal is in search of their first championship since 1993. The seemingly never-ending line of former Flyers who have won hockey’s top prize will undoubtedly grow longer this season, and now it’s a matter of which name and team will be engraved on Lord Stanley’s Cup.