Flyers should retain a valuable asset: Del Zotto

The Flyers made what they believed to be a smart, short-term personnel decision last week, signing defenseman Nick Schultz to a two-year contract extension, leaving a player more deserving of such a show of faith to wait a little longer to learn of his future.

Michael Del Zotto has saved his NHL career this season with the Flyers. His game-winning goal in their 3-2 victory Sunday over the Washington Capitals was just the latest example of why swift-skating defensemen are so valuable in today's NHL, and why general manager Ron Hextall should have sought to sign Del Zotto before committing two more years and $4.5 million to Schultz.

It's more than a coincidence that the Flyers have clawed back into the playoff race just as Del Zotto has been playing his best hockey of the year. He has five goals in his last 14 games, rediscovering the offense-oriented style of play that he'd lost during his 41/2 seasons with the New York Rangers and his half-season with the Nashville Predators. The Flyers signed him to a one-year, $1.3 million free-agent deal in the summer just as they were finding out how severe Kimmo Timonen's blood-clot situation was, and Del Zotto has rewarded that low-risk move by emerging as a piece for the team to retain as Hextall tries to remake the Flyers' group of defensemen.

Understand: This is no slight to Schultz. He is a savvy player with 13 seasons of NHL experience, and for a defense that's often shaky, he's been sound and very good. But he's 32 - eight years older than Del Zotto - and with Hextall fighting for every cent he can spare under the salary cap, Del Zotto's youth and speed should have made him the higher priority.

"Can't control what happens," said Del Zotto, who has seven goals and 22 points this season, second on the team among defensemen in both categories to Mark Streit. "It's a business, and I've learned that many times now. I've said it from day one: I love it here. It's the closest group of guys I've ever played with. It's a treat to come to work every day and battle with these guys."

After a three-week stretch in December when his carelessness in the Flyers' zone consigned him to being a nightly scratch, Del Zotto has logged at least 21 minutes of ice time in 16 of the last 17 games, and he and Streit provide a dimension that the Flyers' defense would lack without them. In the sequence that led to Del Zotto's goal Sunday, Jake Voracek surged into the Capitals' zone, then pulled up along the right-wing boards and threw a cross-ice pass to Del Zotto.

Del Zotto cruised below the left circle before shooting the puck, and that's the risk-reward he must weigh every time he's on the ice. This time, Alex Ovechkin was also on the ice, and if Del Zotto mishandled the pass or missed the net, he might have sprung one of the NHL's most feared scorers for a counterattack. Instead, Del Zotto ripped a wrist shot over goaltender Braden Holtby's glove, with 4 minutes, 13 seconds left in regulation.

"It's knowing who you are, time of the game," Del Zotto said. "There's a fine line between being too aggressive and too cautious, and when I saw the opening there, I knew who had the puck. I know if I get open, he's going to find me nine times out of 10. It worked out fine."

This was the sort of play that Del Zotto, at the end of his career in New York and throughout his brief time in Nashville, seemed to have forgotten how to make.He had spent his first four seasons with the Rangers playing in an oppressive defensive system under coach John Tortorella. The demands were simple and brutal: Block shots. Play with a jagged edge. Don't take chances. Confined like a racehorse in a stable, Del Zotto made too many mistakes, and even after the Rangers fired Tortorella and traded Del Zotto to the Predators, he needed time to find himself again.

"It was a tough year," he said. "You feel you're playing well, and then you're taken out of the lineup, not knowing where you are, what your role is on the team. But some adversity like that makes you stronger. I truly believe that it made me stronger as an individual. I never doubted my ability or my game.

"I know what I can do. I've been successful in this league, and I know I can be."

By now, the Flyers ought to know it, too, and they ought to act accordingly.

@MikeSielski