FLYERS NEWS

The Orange and Black kept it rolling tonight as the archrival New York Rangers visited the Wells Fargo center. Claude Giroux again made up for the absence of Danny Briere, with 2 points, both on the power play, both sweet assists. If Giroux can do all this without Briere just imagine what could he do with Briere in the lineup. Aside from Giroux's heroics the Flyer's defense took care of the rest. They held the Rangers to just 21 shots on goal and killed off 3 of the 4 Ranger power plays. Sergei Bobrovsky was a big part of those penalty kills as he outplayed the Flyer killer, Henrik Lundqvist, with 20 saves out of 21 shots, to Lundqvist's 17 of 21. He's clearly growing in confidence with each game and making it harder and harder to envision Micheal Leighton back in front of the net.

The Flyers actually fell behind early in the 2nd period on a power play tally by Brandon Dubinksy, but were in command after that. Just 4 minutes later Mike Richards evened the score with his own power play goal and Giroux picked up his first point of the night with the assist. 4 minutes later Blair Betts poked another one in for a 2-1 lead. Later with about 5 minutes left in the 2nd, Giroux picked up his 2nd point, assisting on a score by Nikolay Zherdev for 3-1 lead. Only 3 minutes into the 3rd period Chris Pronger blasted in the Orange and Black's 2nd power play goal of the night for a 4-1 lead that all but put New York away. 5 Bobrovsky saves later and the Flyers had their 5th straight win and sole possession of first place in the Eastern conference by a point over the Tampa Bay Lightning.