FLYERS NEWS

Clinging to the 8th spot in the Eastern conference after pulling out a win in their last game, the Flyers needed only to pull out another one against the Rangers tonight to sneak into the 7th spot. Marty Biron got the start in goal tonight and played fairly fell, saving 23 of the 26 shots he faced to help the Orange and Black to a thrilling victory. In the first period of play Mike Richards scored an early goal for a 1-0 Flyer's lead. In the second period of play there was no scoring. In the 3rd period of play Danny Briere scored a late goal for a 2-0 Flyer's lead. A couple minutes later Marek Malik and Nigel Dawes each scored goals within a minute of each other to quickly knot it up at 2. A few minutes later Briere answered back to put the Flyers up again 3-2. Finally with just under 2 minutes to play Jaromir Jagr scored tie up again at 3, and the send the game into overtime. In the overtime period neither team could score and the game lapsed into a shootout, usually a harbinger of impending doom for the Flyers. Not tonight. In the first round of the shootout Mike Richards scored for the Flyers, while Brendan Shanahan failed to score for the Rangers. Finally in the second round of the shootout Jeff Carter scored for the Flyers and Nigel Dawes failed to score for the Ranger, and the Flyers had pulled out another one 4-3. So the Flyers improve to 37-28-10 overall, but remain 4th in the Atlantic division and jump to 7th in the Eastern conference, just a point ahead of 8th place Boston, 2 ahead of Washington, and 3 ahead of Buffalo.