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//  Saturday, July 31, 2010

Emery blanks Canes in return to NHL

Saturday, October 3, 2009
Posted by Brandan Hartland

Ray Emery made 28 saves in his Philadelphia Flyer debut as his team defeated the Carolina Hurricanes, 2-0, on Friday night.

“He’s looked more comfortable every day,” Philadelphia coach John Stevens said. “He looks alert, he’s finding pucks, he makes saves on effort and he was tremendous.”

Jeff Carter and Mike Richards scored powerplay goals for the Flyers 22 seconds apart as special teams dominated the contest. Carolina wasn't able to convert on eight powerplay chances and was shut out in their opener for the first time in franchise history. 

“We definitely had the opportunities, especially on the powerplay,” Eric Staal said. “I don’t think we moved it around terribly bad. It just didn’t fall for us. We had a lot of chances, (hit) a couple posts. … We were hoping to get to the net and kind of get an ugly one.”

With Sergei Samsonov in the penalty box serving a double-minor for high sticking, Carter struck first for the Flyers when he backhanded a rebound past Cam Ward. Moments later, Richards made it a two-goal game on a deflection through traffic.

“Special teams bailed us out tonight,” Richards said. “Penalty-killing did a good job, we scored on a couple of power plays … and that was the difference.”

Playing two days after signing a six-year, $37.8 million contract, Ward stopped 25 shots for Carolina.

The two goals would be all the offense Emery would need. He spent last season playing in Russia, but returned to the NHL in hopes of a comeback. He picked up where he left off in the preseason, when he had a 1.78 goals-against average and .943 save percentage.

“It’s definitely some preparation, but you never can tell until you actually get out there” in the regular season, Emery said.

Emery has shut out the Hurricanes in his last three appearances against them. His last complete-game regular-season shutout was a 2-0 victory over Carolina in February 2007, when he was with Ottawa. The following season, he and Martin Gerber combined to blank the Hurricanes, but Emery logged only about 5 1/2 minutes of ice time in that game.

Philadelphia's other big off-season acquisition, Chris Pronger, did an excellent job of shutting Staal down.

“When you don’t score on the power play, you’re always feeling like that was the difference in the game for you,” Carolina coach Paul Maurice said. “But in terms of some of the (other) shots we got in tight, we’d like to (have scored on) those.”

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