The Flyers beat New Jersey 2-1 in a ‘classic’ defensive battle in Philly last night.
The first period was played tight by both teams. The second period started to open up after a bad penalty call against Johnsson. The Flyers took two bad penalties putting them down 5 on 3 twice. The Flyers gained momentum off killing the penalties and Knuble scored about halfway thru the period. Sharp scored the winning goal about 3 minutes later. It was his 5th goal of the season, the first against a team besides the Islanders.
Ben Eager made his NHL debut picking up his first point on the Sharp goal. Eager looked good, had 7 minutes of ice time and a great hit on Pihlman.

“I think we were kind of in shock there when Peter went out and we didn’¢t recover in the first game he was out,” said Ken Hitchcock. “We are recovered now. We are obviously having to play a little different right now, but I think our team is very comfortable playing this way right now. We have to work and we have to check. We were very effective tonight.”

Sharp, Hatcher and Brashear were the three stars. Esche played very well in goal, personally I think he should have been one of the stars.

Flyers now lead the season series with the Devils 2-0.

Ken Hitchcock became the seventh coach in Flyers history to record 100 wins.