The Flyers deserve credit for the way they avoided a potential letdown last night after their road win in Pittsburgh on Friday. They jumped on the Islanders early and never gave them a sense that they could get back in the game.

The Flyers finally got their blueline off the goal-scoring schneid, and the offensive contributions of Kimmo Timonen and Chris Pronger opened up a new dimension to the attack. The Flyers have put up big goal totals -- helped in no small part by a powerplay that is now in synch -- in each of their last three home games. With the exception of the team's subpar effort in Columbus, they have looked over the last week like the club that came so agonizingly close to winning the Stanley Cup this past spring. Other notes:

* I hope that Danny Briere can avoid a suspension for his late-game crosscheck to the face of Frans Nielsen, but I suspect he's going to get at least one game for it.

* It is going to be very, very interesting to see how Nikolay Zherdev responds to being a healthy scratch in the last two games. The timing of his demotion to the fourth line after his best game of the season was a litmus test of the player's mental toughness. He failed the test. Rather than skating all out and practicing with a chip on his shoulder to make a statement to Peter Laviolette, he sulked and gave a half-hearted effort to get himself further in the doghouse.

In the short term, the move has shown that consistent hard work will be rewarded with playing time. You have to be happy for Andreas Nodl that he hasn't just gotten into the lineup, he's also finally scored a couple goals (albeit one of the empty net variety). Laviolette pushed the right button at this time, also getting a goal from Dan Carcillo in Pittsburgh in the process.

In the long term, I'm still not sure if Laviolette is handling Zherdev the right way. After all ,the objective is to get the most out of each player's talents, not to lose him. As long as Zherdev is wearing the orange and black, the objective should be to get as much production as possible from him.

I feel no sympathy for Zherdev about his ice time or being scratched the last two games. There is enough talent on the roster for there to be competition for powerplay time and the opportunity to get out during 4-on-4 situations. Players who are winners relish such situations, and prove they deserve to be the go-to guy. Underachievers whine about their ice time and put themselves about the team's record.

Zherdev came into this season with the opportunity to prove that he belongs in the first category of players and has matured as a hockey player. So far, he's blown the opportunity, and a half-dozen excellent shifts in a single game doesn't change that.

* Sergei Bobrovsky has been very good in each of his last two starts. It appears that Laviolette is now giving him an extended opportunity to claim the starting job rather than rotating on an alternating-game basis with Brian Boucher.

* The word I have heard on Patrick Maroon's dismissal from the Phantoms was that he had problems with several teammates and had been defiant to his coaches, and it was an ongoing pattern of unprofessional behavior that led to him being sent home.

Contrary to rumors I had heard, which had it that there had been a physical confrontation between Maroon and a coach (similar to the Tony Voce incident in which the player was immediately dismissed after initiating an altercation with Kjell Samuelsson), the official word is that things came to a head not because of a single explosive incident but because he had become a negative presence on the club that surpassed his productivity on the ice (even as the club's leading scorer this season).

Phantoms head coach Greg Gilbert has been taking a lot of criticism over the last season plus for his handling of his players and for the club's lack of success on the ice. There are some who have blamed him for the lack of progress shown by most of his young players, and for the dismissal of Maroon. While the coach may or may not have been part of the problem, the buck ultimately stops with the player.

As with Zherdev, the cream has to rise to the top. If you are unhappy with the coach, stick it to him with your production on the ice. Maroon didn't do it last year, but he was certainly doing it this year. Whatever his locker room issues, he was delivering on the ice this season after a disappointing second pro season last year.

Here's what's strange to me: The organization sent a message to Maroon by not calling him last season, by talking up the free agent signings of Mike Testwuide and Ben Holmstrom and by sending Maroon back to the Phantoms in the preseason before he dressed in a single exhibition game with the big club. That was a marked departure from from last fall, when Maroon was the guy being talked up as a potential callup (before getting hurt and going on to a subpar season).

Judging solely by his production on the ice so far this season, the message seemed to be getting through, and the problems of the past seemed to behind him. I guess not. No player is bigger than the team, especially at the minor league level. If Maroon was really causing problems with his teammates and coaches, he was better off being removed.

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