Kovacevic: What would Bobby Clarke have done?

Bobby Clarke might have cracked a dozen ankles.

Paul Holmgren might have clubbed someone senseless.

Ron Hextall might have chased Jake Guentzel all over the rink, stick held high like a machete.

But these Flyers, assuming they're still really the Flyers, did nothing even as the Penguins skated, slipping pucks through their legs, dipsy-doodling around them like orange-and-black PennDOT pylons ...

... and admit it, you just kept waiting for it, all through what wound up a 7-0 romp between archrivals in the opening game of the Stanley Cup playoffs Wednesday night at PPG Paints Arena.

If not with Evgeni Malkin's magic up there in the second period, then maybe in the third when Kris Letang took a slashing penalty against physical winger Travis Konecny and another for high-sticking physical defenseman Brandon Manning?

How about when Jamie Oleksiak rattled Oskar Lindblom with a clean but crushing check, also in the third when the game was well out of hand?

Nope. Nothing. Konecny threw a hard early shoulder into Patric Hornqvist in the first. Sean Couturier was called for a dangerous, though hardly vicious, trip on Letang. Scott Laughton was called for a whack on Malkin's leg. And the Flyers, for whatever this is worth, had a 39-27 edge in recorded hits. But in the entire third, with the blowout in full bloom and a chance to at least send some kind of message toward Game 2, there wasn't one penalty or even a post-whistle scrum.

There wasn't much afterward, either, in a docile locker room.

“I don’t think we weren’t ready,” Couturier would insist. “Guys were excited and anxious to get going. But their best players were better than ours, and we just have to be better.”

“Obviously, there’s some anger in here," Shayne Gostisbehere was saying of something that was not at all obvious. “It’s only 1-0 in the series and there’s a lot of hockey to be played. They could have beaten us in overtime tonight, and they beat us, 7-0, and it’s the same thing.”

It isn't. At all. Couturier and Gostisbehere were each branded with a minus-4 on the night.

So was Claude Giroux, who at least mustered up, "It was one of the worst games I’ve been part of.”

But he showed none of his old edge. Neither did the other two notable veterans, Jakub Voracek and Wayne Simmonds, who were barely visible.

My goodness, Radko Gudas, who would cross-check his grandma just to amuse himself, didn't once make his way to the box.

This is particularly jarring, I'll bet, for those of us who go back a generation with seeing the Flyers -- who are still run by the three men I mentioned in the lede -- behave this passively. Because the fact is, most other current teams in the Eastern Conference, even the Penguins, probably would have shown more snarl in the same setting. Imagine the Blue Jackets or Capitals.

I get it: This is just who the Flyers are now, to some extent. But those three guys ... there's no way they'll stand for it. If they've got to bring up a busload of ex-cons from their AHL affiliate in Lehigh Valley to extract some blood, they'll do it. And I'll believe that until I don't.

• The Penguins didn't have much to say about this either, probably wisely.

Asked if the game had any kind of edge to it, Jake Guentzel diplomatically replied, "It was playoff hockey."

No, it really wasn't.

• It most definitely wasn't playoff goaltending on the Philadelphia end. Brian Elliott was a mess, beginning with Bryan Rust's goal 2:38 after the opening faceoff. He had no business bumping that rebound off his blocker right back out in the slot, and he had no business dropping to both knees after he did:

Petr Mrazek isn't the answer, either. The Flyers don't have an answer, which is why I don't blame Hakstol for finding at least a temporary way to diffuse any controversy by claiming of Elliott, "He’s our guy. He’s a huge reason why our team’s in the playoffs. Like everything else, we’ll look at it. But my gut instinct right now is that he’s our guy and I don’t think we’ll go away from him."

OK, so maybe that didn't diffuse anything.

More on this via spoken word:

• Sidney Crosby is great, in the most literal sense of the term. Malkin is great, in the equally literal sense of the term. Maybe this will be the playoff that ensures that's engraved not just on a trophy but in the collective mind of the hockey world.

• Never take performances like that for granted, never mind coming on the same night. Pittsburgh's been blessed beyond words by the hockey gods for three decades running.

• Give it up for Derick Brassard. He was a top-six forward for years with regular duty on the top power play. He knows he's got no chance of either in Pittsburgh, but he goes out with the second unit and plays middleman on this tic-tac-toe beauty to Guentzel in the second:

That's an elite NHL pass, with vision and precision.

And did you see Brassard celebrating the goal even more than Guentzel?

That guy loves the playoffs. And if that didn't quell some of the doubters about the trade, maybe the Penguins blocking 24 pucks without Ian Cole will. It was the right move.

• Really give it up for Riley Sheahan. He was just coming into his own with the Penguins when management moved mountains to get Brassard and bump him down the depth chart. He's done anything but pout and, on this night, was actually better than an effective Brassard. He was outstanding.

• Remember what I wrote about Matt Murray needing to demonstrate east-west fluidity to put down the Flyers?

Well, there was this in the first period ...

I'm not buying the common postgame narrative in both rooms that the save was some big turning point. For one, Scott Laughton, the 23-year-old handling that puck as if it were a manhole cover, was appearing in his first playoff game and, as Hakstol strikingly observed, the kid looked "tight" on the sequence. For another, I can't be convinced that the Penguins wouldn't have chased Brian Elliott whether or not Laughton had tied the score at 1-1 there.

Murray himself dismissed the save with a half-shrug and this: "I just tried to be aggressive on the guy in the slot, but he made a good pass. I just needed to get over there after that.”

But it's fair to praise Murray for the extraordinary effort involved in that save, as well as two other sharp ones through the first 25-30 minutes, that had to have been deflating for the Flyers, who feed almost entirely off their scoring.

"When we made mistakes," Mike Sullivan would say, "I thought Matt made some big stops for us."

It's neat to note that, in addition to this being Murray's third consecutive playoff shutout -- right, Nashville -- he's also established the franchise's longest shutout stretch of 206 minutes, 26 seconds.

• One negative: Phil Kessel went without a point or even a shot, and he generally didn't look like himself. Which has to mean that whatever injury's been bugging him of late is still bugging him.

• What a crowd:

That was just for warmups.

Honestly, where do all these noisy people hide through the regular season?

• A second puck?

It wasn't what it seemed when a second black disc appeared on the ice following a faceoff in the second period, even though two players, including Letang, lunged to play it. It was actually part of Letang's skate.

As he'd explain while holding up the boot, a piece of his skate guard -- a black circular piece of heavy-duty material designed to prevent foot injuries -- was missing from the side.

"It fooled me, too," he'd say.

There are always fresh firsts for anything in any sport.

• With all due respect to the event, nothing moved me on this night like Ryan Shazier standing and leading the crowd in the opening chant of "Let's go Pens!"

Playoffs... HERE WE GO.#BurghProud pic.twitter.com/Ro4JhsGVlw

— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) April 11, 2018

He and Letang, whose No. 58 sweater he was wearing, have become friends. And he's become an "inspiration to all of us," as Letang would word it later, something apparent through the players' actions as well: When Shazier was shown on the big board, Carl Hagelin pretty much jumped off the bench and began smacking his stick on the boards to lead the show of appreciation.

Try to imagine, even if none of us can, how much easier it would be for Shazier to recoil, to remain private while he rehabilitates.

Then try to imagine the courage, the strength it takes to stand -- and by God, I mean stand! -- out there in front of all of us as often as he does.

There are victories, and there are victories.

MATT SUNDAY GALLERY