The Flyers are about to enter a stretch of five games in seven nights, beginning with a home-and-home set against a Toronto Maple Leafs club that won six of its last 10 games. If Philly can take eight of 10 points in the games against the Leafs, Bruins, Penguins and Thrashers, they'll be in good position to control their own destiny in the race for playoff positioning.
It's doable. A 3-0-2 or 4-1-0 record in the next week will give the Flyers 86 points heading into the final eight games of the season; all of which are played within the Atlantic Division.
With all due respect to whichever club wins the Southeast Division, the ideal spot for the Flyers to finish would be as the sixth seed in the East. As of now, Carolina is in the driver's seat to win the Southeast, with Washington still on the radar screen, seven points behind (with one game in hand). Either way, the Flyers are capable of beating either the Canes or the Caps in a first-round series.
It's easy to forget now that, prior to the Flyers' 10-game losing streak, they were the second seed in the East and pushing for the top overall spot in the conference. While the team has been a bit inconsistent since finally ending a slide that temporarily pushed them out of a playoff spot, there' still time to peak when it counts. When reasonably healthy, the Flyers can roll out a pretty solid lineup even without Simon Gagne.
Once the playoffs start, you can throw out teams' regular season records and head-to-head records from the regular season. Even so, the Flyers would probably like to avoid New Jersey and Montreal in the first round of the playoffs.
If Philly can get a healthy Mike Richards and Joffrey Lupul back into the lineup and keep some of their walking wounded (Daniel Briere, Jason Smith, etc) able to play, they can still put up a tough challenge to any Eastern Conference opponent, including New Jersey.
But at the end of the day it'll come down to how well they play defense as a team and the quality of goaltending provided by Martin Biron.
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Without question, goaltending is the weakest area of the Flyers' farm system. The organization is more or less devoid of high-end goaltending prospects.
At the pro level, none among Martin Houle, Jeremy Duchesne or Scott Munroe project as NHL starters.
At the junior level, Jakub Kovar is a decent prospect but may need an overage season plus minor league seasoning before his potential can be fairly gauged. University of Notre Dame freshman and USA Hockey product Brad Phillips needs at least two more college seasons. Michael Dupont doesn't appear to be in the picture, and has been an average junior keeper.
Any goaltender the Flyers draft this June will also require considerable patience. This year's top goaltending crop in North America has been rather inconsistent and, among the top Europeans, young Brynäs goaltender Jakob Markström is an up-and-comer but is not head and shoulders better than several others in his group.
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There have been 68 Gordie Howe hat tricks in
Flyers history . The most recent one was recorded by Mike Richards in December of the current season.
Not surprisingly, Rick Tocchet is the club's all-time leader in this category. He had seven different games in his two-stint Flyers career where he had at least one goal, one assist and one fight. Eric Lindros did it five times, as did Bobby Clarke.
Research has shown that Mr. Hockey himself only had one such game his entire career(December 22, 1955). Brendan Shanahan is the all-time leader in this unofficial category with nine.
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Members of the Tampa Bay Lightning took issue with the Flyers repeatedly showing Riley Cote's two-punch KO of Andre Roy on Arenavision last Thursday night.
NHL league policy League prohibits "replays that are provocative or present the opposition in an unfavorable light." Although the Flyers could be fined by the league, it does not appear as if the club will receive more than a reprimand.
My knee-jerk Philadelphian reaction to the replay "controversy": Apart from his pride, Roy was not injured in the fight and was a willing participant. Showing a replay of a player being carried off on a stretcher or struggling to get to his feet is crossing the line. Showing a clean kayo to pump up the home crowd is within the boundaries, although the clip was overused.
It could also be argued that showing this replay was far less objectionable than Buffalo having repeatedly shown Brian Campbell's clean but concussion-inducing hit on R.J. Umberger in the 2006 playoffs.
It's also no certainly worse than an oft-shown clip that highlights the Flyers-Leafs rivalry. From time to time, we still see replays of a woozy Sami Kapanen falling down and struggling to the bench from a Darcy Tucker hit on the sequence that ended with Jeremy Roenick jumping on the ice to score the series-winning OT goal in Toronto in the 2004 playoffs. Somehow, the truly meaningful part of the equation -- Roenick's goal -- gets conveniently omitted from the clip.
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If the Flyers were truly intent on showing a video clip designed to ridicule an opposing team, this
cringeworthy blast from the New York Rangers' past would make for ample cannon fodder. The Rangers in the Sasson jeans commercial from 1980 are Ron Duguay, Phil Esposito, team captain Dave Maloney, Anders Hedberg and defenseman Ron Greschner.
Somehow, I have a hard time picturing the equivalent Flyers players of that era -- Bobby Clarke, Bill Barber, captain Mel Bridgman, Brian Propp and Behn Wilson -- figure skating and sashaying in designer jeans.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
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