This is about as close to "must win" territory as you get less than 10 games into the season.
Regardless of what happens tonight between the Flyers and Sidney Crosby's Penguins, nothing is going to affect Craig Berube's job or even Paul Holmgren's as the GM.
But a FLyer loss tonight would be especially devastating because they would have a full six days to contemplate its meaning before playing again.
And by then, we would have some kind of major trade to bring a scoring winger in here.
The comments coming from Flyers captain Claude Giroux this morning were both comforting, if you're a fan, and alarming, as the same time.
“What’s going on right now makes me think of when we played Boston in the playoffs,” Giroux said, recalling the 2010 Stanley Cup semifinals.
“We were down 3-0, but we were talking to ourselves and we were like, ‘How the hell are we down 3-0? We should be up 3-0.’ We just stayed with it and came back and won the series.
“It’s a long season. If you think about it, we still have 75 games left. That’s a lot of games.
"Tonight’s gonna be a game to bring the fans back on our side and show them that we’re a good team and can win games.
"I’m guessing we’ll be ready to go. This could be a turning point of the year."
Guessing? It IS the turning point. The Flyers have played well enough to have two or three more wins to their total. You can see the team getting better. You feel it.
Yet each and every game there are one or two instances that prove to be fatal. A bad penalty. An uncovered man in the slot for an easy goal. A bad bounce.
It has to change and the nice thing about Penguin encounters is that NOTHING from the past or present matters because anything can happen. Logic and stats go to the wayside when these two clubs meet.
“The last few games, obviously we haven’t been winning games, but the way we’ve been playing, it looks better,” defenseman Kimmo Timonen said.
“Still, we’re losing games so we can’t be happy. But after the coaching change, it’s not a one-night thing. It’s going to take time to get the system down, really understand what to do in different situations.
“We’re moving in the right direction, but the only thing we need now is a couple wins in a row and to get the confidence back.”
Here's more on the game from CSNPhilly.com:
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