At the start of the season, it was all about the Flyers being a "third period team". Lately, however, they have been scoring early on in the game and then losing their stamina after the second and becoming more of a second period team. You can tell in this game because there was three goals in the first period, only one of which belonged to the Flyers. The second period turned over with the Flyers having the only two goals (both by Jeff Carter to be exact). This game was especially crucial in order for the Flyers to keep their number one spot in the Eastern Conference with the Capitals only one point behind. Lately the team as a whole has been slacking, probably because they have held the number one spot for quite a while now. With it being crunch time for the playoffs, most of the teams are stepping up their game to secure a spot while the Flyers seem to be, for lack of a better word, careless. Their lack of effort can be seen during almost every game including the last one when the Flyers were leading 4-1 (courtesy of a hat trick from Ville Leino) and then all of a sudden it was in overtime and they lost 4-5. When they are in the lead, all that needs to be done is to maintain, and they can't even seem to do that anymore. Defense is slipping, along with effort from both goaltenders. Certainly, Chris Pronger being injured doesn't help but he is definitely not the whole team and they should be able to deal without him.
This game was certainly better than the last, with defense stepping up, Boucher making some good saves, and players-especially Leino-seeming to get a boost of confidence as far as scoring with a win of 3-2. Since the Capitals also won their game tonight, they are still only one point behind the Flyers in standings. This time until the playoffs should be interesting to say the least.
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