Philadelphia Flyers at New Jersey Devils, March 30, 2007

Philadelphia Flyers: 76GP ; 21W-44L-11OTL ; 53 points ; last 10 games : 3-7-0 ; 5th Atlantic
New Jersey Devil: 77GP ; 45W-24L-8OTL ; 98 points ; last 10 games : 5-5-0 ; 1st Atlantic

Season series:

The Devils have played the Flyers six times already. They hold a 5-0-1 advantage in the season series. There are two games remaining: on Friday and on April 5. Despite their terrible record the Flyers have given the Devils a tough time.

Home, Oct 14, 2006: New Jersey 3, Philadelphia 2
Away, Dec 2, 2006: New Jersey 4, Philadelphia 3, SO
Home, Dec 8, 2006: New Jersey 2, Philadelphia 0
Home, Jan 20, 2007: New Jersey 4, Philadelphia 3, SO
Away, Feb 1, 2007: New Jersey 6, Philadelphia 5, OT
Away, Mar 6, 2007: Philadelphia 5, New Jersey 4, OT

As shown above, two games went to the shootout, two ended in overtime and one was a one-goal game in regulation. The only clear win came on December 8 went the Devils blanked the Flyers.

New Jersey Devils
The Devils are back home after a 5-game road trip. They have a 2-3 record on the trip. Wednesday night's loss have the Devils splitting the season series against the conference leading Buffalo Sabres. The Devils have been struggling in March (5-6-2) and at home (5 straight losses). The month is almost over and the Devils are looking forward to the month of April probably thinking it can't be worse. They were struck with injuries to key players (Gionta, Elias, Madden, Rasmussen, White) and are just waiting for Gionta and Madden to return. Both players won't be available for Friday's game.

Philadelphia Flyers
The Flyers have had a dreadful season. They are last in the division and in the league. They will miss the playoffs for the first time since 1994. They have lost their GM and their Coach (Hitchcock) earlier this year. New management has a lot of work to put them back on track and clearly next year is the focus now. Even though the Flyers are losing more than winning, they can have a spoiler role like on Wednesday night when they beat Carolina 5-1 in a convincing way.

You can expect a hard fought game between the two Atlantic division rivals. The Flyers will probably get up for this game and be ready for the Devils. The last couple of games have been pretty physical between the two teams. After the February 1 game, Coach Julien was angered by the dirt the Flyers put on the ice and the play of Ben Eager who was running around all game, was challenged to fight by Mike Rupp and David Hale and refused.


The Devils will host the Bruins on Sunday afternoon. The game will start at 3:30 pm.


The first game of the season was almost cancelled when a water-main break occured. The break was repaired just in time for the game.
On December 8, Brodeur recorded his 84th shutout and tied Glenn Hall for third place overall when he blanked the Flyers.


“We’ll get him in before the end of the year, and he’ll play in a couple of games”
Devils General Manager Lou Lamoriello about Richard Matvichuk, in The New york Times

“To remain as optimistic and as positive as he has is a credit to his personality”
Devils Coach Claude Julien about Matvichuk and his attitude after missing the whole season to recover from back surgery. (Source: The New york Times)


Check out today's article in the New York Times: Waiting Wears on a Defenseman. A good article about Richard Matvichuk's long and slow recovery from back surgery.


Brad Lukowich's heroics
The Devils' defenseman scored 4 goals this year. Three of them came against the Flyers. He scored shorthanded to tie the game on December 2 with 2:12 left in the third period. The Devils went on to win the game in the shootout. He scored again with 49.5 seconds left in overtime in the Devils' win on February 1. On March 6, he scored the tying goal with 5:35 left in regulation. The Devils lost that game but managed to grab a point.