Let's Try This Again: Flyers Look to Herd Buffalo and/or Rattle the Sabres

So, game 1 of the non-Phillies winter abyss went absolutely crappily for those of us looking for some relaxing regular season action on Monday night. The Flyers let us down, and we're betting they got an earful from a disappointed Lavvy after the game. They're lucky this is a game night, or there might've been a pretty heavy practice today.� Commenters in this morning's recap were as angry as we've seen since before the 2009 playoff run. We're not a town that tolerates underperformance well, and that's exactly what we got in last night's loss to the Blue Jackets. Tonight, on home ice, it better not happen again. No Phillies across the parking lot. No Eagles. Just a packed building of people who want to see the team that marched through the Eastern Conference side of the playoff brackets last spring. Sergei Bobrovsky gets the nod in net for the home side, and he'll face America's son, Ryan Miller. The Sabres have been good on the road, and terrible at home, but ya know what? It's really way too early to look at splits that are often misleading anyway. Last night's loss in Columbus had little to do with the Blue Jackets, although they played pretty well. And tonight's prep shouldn't be about Ryan Miller or Thomas Vanek or anyone else in the road whites. It should be expected that they'll come to play, and if the Flyers play like they did last night, they'll get rung up like the Devils did on Saturday (a 6-1 loss to Buffalo).� The Flyers just need to play their game, and do it a lot more thoughtfully than we saw yesterday. They sent the waves as usual, and although giveaways will come with that strategy at times, there were too many last night, leading to too many odd-man rushes. This thread wouldn't be complete without the customary "don't take so many goddamn penalties" key to the game either. It's easy to wring our hands over the lack of production from forwards not on the Briere line, but what kind of chemistry can they develop when so much time is spent on the kill, or, with any luck, on the powerplay? We're not kicking the latter out of bed, but the Flyers need as much 5-on-5 time as they can get right now.� Hopefully Bob can pick up where Brian Boucher left off. Boosh was easily the best player on the Flyers' ice last night. His defense let him down some after a great game against Toronto, so who knows what will happen in front of Bob.� Philly needs a win right about now, or at the very least a battle we can appreciate.�

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