Yeah I know I am a little late on this.

The Philadelphia Flyers lost in Buffalo to the Sabres Thursday night 4-2.
Simon Gagne and Mike Knuble each scored a goal for the Flyers.

“The first period was the one that hurt us. That had us on our heels at the start. They were ready to play and we weren’t.” – Ken Hitchcock.

So all the Flyers on Therien Time now? The Flyers looked slow, which is expected to a point since the Sabres are just a faster team. The problem was the effort. The Flyers need to start playing hard from the first drop of the puck, not halfway thru the game and not after going down by a goal. This has been routine much of the season. It’s just the past month they have stopped being able to come back.

Josh Gratton was called up from the Phantoms only to be a healthy scratch. Both Stevenson and Nedved had nagging injuries that made them questionable for the game. Usually not a big deal, but the Phantoms were off for the AHL break and Gratton and a bunch of Phantoms were kicking back in the Poconos. Being called back off vacation is bad, being called back only to be a healthy scratch just sucks.

Three stars for the game were Ryan Miller, Jochen Hecht and Taylor Pyatt
While Ryan Miller played a really good game, first star he didn’t deserve. But I contribute that to the media and the fans in the Buffalo area thinking Miller deserves to be in the Olympics and they are probably right.
Goalies on the US Olympics roster are Rick DiPietro, Robert Esche, and John Grahame. While I wont really get into who deserves to go and who doesn’t I will say this. While this year Robert Esche hasn’t been spectacular he did outstanding last season taking the Flyers to game seven of the conference finals. Team USA had to make a decision earlier in the season and since Miller did not have a lot of time in the NHL, Team USA overlooked him. If they would have made the decision closer to the Olympics he would probably be chosen.