The Philadelphia Flyers cleaned house this past offseason moving, among others, Mike Richards, the team captain whose immaturity was said to have fractured the locker room and resulted in the Flyguys' second round sweep at the hands of the Boston Bruins to end the 2011 campaign.
Heading into 2011-12 the Flyers placed an emphasis on leadership and chemistry.
To steady the ship the Flyers named veteran defenseman Chris Pronger as their new captain, who played in only 50 regular season games and three of 11 postseason games in 2010-11.
The Flyers were captainless for all but the 13 games Pronger was able to play in while dealing with concussion-like symptoms.
Despite the loss of Pronger, who did not play after November 19, the Flyers were a tight-knit team with a strong veteran locker room presence that was able to lead a very young roster to a 100-point season and a playoff series win despite no active player replacing Pronger as the official captain.
Danny Briere, Kimmo Timonen, Jaromir Jagr and Max Talbot were and are battle-tested veterans capable of leading on the ice and by example and did ...
Read Full Article at Bleacher Report - NHL
Article written by Bill Matz
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