FanHouse Braydon Coburn

If you're a Penguins fan, there was certainly a lot to like about their 4-1 win over the Philadelphia Flyers in the opening game of their Eastern Conference playoff series on Wednesday night.

They received offense from the usual suspects (Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin), they were strong defensively and on the penalty kill, and they even picked up a pair of goals from Tyler Kennedy and Mark Eaton. All things considered, it was a strong showing.

The one area they can improve? As has been the case much of the season, the power play.

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The Flyers and Rangers split a home-and-home series over the weekend with a pair of physical games between the two divisional rivals. During Sunday's game, Philadelphia defenseman Braydon Coburn was ejected (and issued a five-minute major) for cross-checking Nik Antropov away from the action.

The Atlanta Thrashers, currently occupying their familiar spot at the bottom of the NHL's standings, are headed for their ninth non-playoff season in their 10-year existence. The team's best player -- and captain -- Ilya Kovalchuk is an unrestricted free agent following next season, while starting netminder Kari Lehtonen is eligible for restricted free agency. Pretty bleak picture.

That said, Thrashers co-owner Bruce Levenson took part in a Q & A session with beat writer Mike Knobler of the Atlanta Journal Constitution this week, and acknowledges the team has made some big mistakes in the past, but is committed to turning this thing around.

Mark down another former NHL player as trying to make a go of it back home in Russia. According to Sovetsky Sport, defenseman Alexei Zhitnik, who was bought out of the last year of his contract by the Atlanta Thrashers just a few weeks ago, has joined Dynamo Moscow on a tryout contract. Details of the deal were confirmed for FanHouse by Dmitry Chesnokov, Sovetsky's Washington correspondent.

According to Chesnokov, the contract expires at the end of Dynamo's training camp. If at that time Zhitnik opts to stay in Russia, Dynamo will have the right of first refusal on any contract that he's offered.

To say that stock in the veteran defenseman has dropped over the past two seasons would be an understatement. Back at the beginning of the 2006-07 season, Zhitnik started the year as a seemingly important cog on an Islanders team full of veterans.

Despite this, he was traded to Philadelphia in a salary dump for Freddy Meyer IV. Then, at the trade deadline, Philadelphia GM Paul Holmgren somehow convinced Atlanta GM Don Waddell to part with Braydon Coburn in exchange for Zhitnik. The deal has since become known as one of the most lopsided in recent NHL history. After a more or less anonymous season in Atlanta where he missed some time due to injury, Waddell was happy to buy out Zhitnik and erase the physical evidence of the biggest mistake in his career as a GM.

As the old saying goes, "If it wasn't for bad luck, the Flyers wouldn't have any luck at all." One day after taking a puck right between his eyes, Braydon Coburn's prospects for Game 3 on Monday are not looking very good. Anyone that saw him go down with blood pouring on the ice probably isn't surprised by that news, but it's still a blow to the Flyers to have the worst confirmed. From the Philadelphia Daily News's Flyers' blog:

Flyers defenseman Braydon Coburn is considered "probably doubtful" for tomorrow night's Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals against Pittsburgh, general manager Paul Holmgren said today.

Coburn required more than 50 stitches to close a circular cut around his left eye suffered early in the Flyers' 4-2 loss Sunday night in Game 2.

There's two ways to read that phrasing from Holmgren: 1.) "It's the Stanley Cup Playoffs and we're not telling you jack about his injury," or, 2.)"He got hit in the face with a puck and has 50 stitches between his eyes ... what do you think?" Since it is the playoffs, we can't really rule out the first one, but the second is certainly more likely. There is at least a silver lining today; there's no damage to Coburn's eye, so he'll likely make a full recovery. If he can't go on Tuesday, Ryan Parent will take his place in the lineup.

NHL Network is replaying last night's Pens-Flyers game right now, which means I got to watch Braydon Coburn get smacked in the face one more time by a deflected puck -- an injury that was as gruesome as it was avoidable.

After all, as Greg Wyshynski pointed out this morning at Puck Daddy, all it may have taken to keep Coburn in the lineup for Philadelphia was a clear plastic visor, a seemingly simple safety measure that more than a few NHL players continue to eschew despite the obvious benefits. But the question nobody seems to be asking is why so many players not only decline to wear a visor, but why the players as a whole through the NHLPA continue to resist making their use mandatory around the league?