{"id":83624,"date":"2020-08-20T21:20:04","date_gmt":"2020-08-21T01:20:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/?p=83624"},"modified":"2020-12-26T16:30:05","modified_gmt":"2020-12-26T21:30:05","slug":"philadelphia-flyers-matt-niskanen-suspended-one-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2020\/08\/20\/philadelphia-flyers-matt-niskanen-suspended-one-game\/","title":{"rendered":"Philadelphia Flyers Matt Niskanen Suspended One Game"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/flyers\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Philadelphia Flyers<\/a> will play their next playoff game without defenceman <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/n\/niskama01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Matt Niskanen<\/a><\/strong>. He has been suspended for one game for cross-checking <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/gallabr01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Brendan Gallagher<\/a><\/strong> of the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/canadiens\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Montreal Canadiens<\/a>. The two teams will play game six on Friday evening. The NHL&#8217;s Player Safety committee announced the suspension late Thursday night.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Philadelphia\u2019s Matt Niskanen has been suspended for one playoff game for Cross-checking Montreal\u2019s Brendan Gallagher. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/x8zPyvNmGX\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/x8zPyvNmGX<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; NHL Player Safety (@NHLPlayerSafety) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NHLPlayerSafety\/status\/1296609420336660480?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">August 21, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Flyers Matt Niskanen Suspended<\/h2>\n<p>Niskanen had a very fine year for the Flyers in 2019-20. The 33-year-old scored eight goals and 33 points in 68 games. This year was one of Niskanen&#8217;s most productive. He also chipped in 124 hits and 84 blocks as one of the team&#8217;s primary defensive defencemen. Niskanen hadn&#8217;t scored a point since the postseason bubble began and that won&#8217;t change after his hit on Gallagher, who is <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/2020\/08\/20\/report-montreal-canadiens-brendan-gallagher-may-have-fractured-jaw\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">out<\/a> with a broken jaw.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/stars\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dallas Stars<\/a> originally drafted Niskanen in the first round of the 2005 Draft. His longest stint was five seasons with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/capitals\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Washington Capitals<\/a> where he helped win a Stanley Cup but Niskanen has been productive over the course of a 13-year career. Overall, Niskanen has 72 goals and 356 points in 949 games. He also has over 1500 hits. Niskanen&#8217;s style of play is generally in decline but there will always be room for a physical blueliner on any roster.<\/p>\n<h3>What This Means for the Future<\/h3>\n<p>Niskanen&#8217;s absence should not affect Philadelphia too deeply. He is one of the team&#8217;s better physical options but they have plenty of others in the bubble. The team brought 10 defenders to the hub in Toronto. None of the other options have Niskanen&#8217;s experience but it&#8217;s only for one game. The team likely uses <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/gostish01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Shayne Gostisbehere<\/a><\/strong> for the fourth time this postseason. Gostisbehere has two assists in three games since the bubble began. Those numbers came after the 26-year-old scored just five goals and 12 points in 42 games. Gostisbehere isn&#8217;t Niskanen but the Flyers are deep enough to close out Montreal without the veteran defender.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<br \/>\n<a id=\"v6D4Pl9ZSDVRsh7Lyy0VIA\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.ca\/detail\/1265737568\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'v6D4Pl9ZSDVRsh7Lyy0VIA',sig:'iQ_stzEeemPp-DaHp1J-iFjg-7rXpDcCZpeqDmfeQM0=',w:'594px',h:'397px',items:'1265737568',caption: true ,tld:'ca',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Philadelphia Flyers will play their next playoff game without defenceman Matt Niskanen. He has been suspended for one game for cross-checking Brendan Gallagher of the Montreal Canadiens. The two teams will play game six on Friday evening. The NHL&#8217;s Player Safety committee announced the suspension late Thursday night. Philadelphia\u2019s Matt Niskanen has been suspended [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3127,"featured_media":83629,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4547,34,4548,16],"tags":[4565,266,5738,2619,2569,955,126,504],"class_list":["post-83624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","category-flyers","tag-2020-stanley-cup-playoffs","tag-brendan-gallagher","tag-hockey-news","tag-matt-niskanen","tag-news","tag-nhl-news","tag-philadelphia-flyers","tag-shayne-gostisbehere"],"modified_by":"Dan Mount, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83624\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}