Thanks to his great talent, Claude Giroux already is a favorite among fans of the Philadelphia Flyers. However, his talent has not been reflected in his statistics yet, with only 47 points during the 2009 NHL season. In 2010 he managed to score 21 points in 23games during the playoffs and he impressed fans again but also made the 2009 results even more disappointing.

During the postseason, Giroux impressed both in offense and defense and so far, his game has continued improving into the 2010 preseason with four assist in four games. He seems to have a good chemistry with teammate Nikolai Zherdev and during Saturday’s game, he certainly was the best player in his team. He dominated the ice from the beginning to the end of the game.

Giroux’s bad 2009 NHL season was mainly due to the fact that he played with inferior linemates in the Philadelphia Flyers. He spent most of his time on the ice playing with Arron Asham and James van Riemsdyk. The first had never scored more than 15 goals in a season and the second was a rookie trying to get used to the pace of the NHL. None of them were the best companions for Giroux, but this season he’ll certainly play with more skilled linemates like Zherdev and Leino.

Besides playing with better linemates, Giroux now has more power play and late game ice time on his back and this should continue during the 2010 NHL season. This added to his natural talent and better teammates could make Giroux a one-point-per-game hockey player during the 2010 season.