Tonight we finally get to eliminate two potential opponents for the Flyers in the second round.

Over the years, I've heard players say, if you're going to win the Stanley Cup, you need to beat the best.

Which is why I've been hoping for the Flyers to get a match-up before it's over with the NY Rangers. They were the Beast of the East for most of the regular season, then stumbled in the last quarter.

That the Flyers failed to win a single game from them left me to believe Peter Laviolette's club would want a re-match.

At this point, I think it would be a far more competitive series with less domination by Henrik Lundqvist but I understand why fans want nothing to do with the Rangers if they can have Ottawa or someone else, instead.

Surprisingly, we found almost to a man that the Flyers don't care who they have to play so long as they start playing again. There is no "we want the Rangers" which is interesting because these are the same players they very much wanted the Pittsburgh Penguins in the first round and they got them.

“You gotta beat every team to raise the Stanley Cup above your head and it really doesn't matter,” Jakub Voracek said.

“They beat us six times this year, but I don't think they're going to be able to do it 10 times. They would have to beat us 10 times if they want to go through us in the playoffs.”

Added Braydon Coburn, “To be honest, I don't really sit there and root for anybody. Whoever the opponent is ... I think I've got enough things to worry about. I don't need to be worrying about who we're going to play because it's totally out of my control.”

I also believe it weighs heavily in the Flyers favor NOT to have home ice. They have now won 27 road games this season - 2 in the first round _ and I think they are much better off starting a series away from home, then carrying that momentum back to Philly.

It certainly seemed to work against the Penguins in the first round.

“We would prefer home ice, but I think that is obviously not up to us with New York, Boston and Florida still playing,” Wayne Simmonds said.

“If they win, they have home ice ahead of us. I think the last series, was good. We started on the road and got two big wins there. We’ve been a good road team all year, so I don’t think it matters if we open on the road.”

What matters a lot is getting Nicklas Grossmann back for Game 1. I have every reason to believe that will happen because it will have been well more than a week since he was concussed and he is skating now.

Andrej Meszaros is not a player until very late in the second round or the start of the third round - if the Flyers get that far.

I really don't like the fact that the team will have had 7 days off but the players feel they need it to rest up and heal. Historically, during the regular season when the Flyers had these long breaks they tended to come out flat the next time on the ice and that can be very dangerous in post-season.

"The alternative is we could have been right back at it today," Coburn said. "It's great to not have to do that thing. This gives some of these young guys a chance to heal up. All us old guys feel great."

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