Rangers continue mastery of Flyers

NEW YORK - On his knees behind the net, Marian Gaborik appeared to be down for the count after getting crushed by Andrej Meszaros with 16 seconds left in the second period.

Somehow, Gaborik mustered the strength to get up and take a weak backhander that amazingly dribbled through Ilya Bryzgalov's pads with 5.1 seconds remaining.

"It was a horse [bleep] goal," Rangers coach John Tortorella admitted.

And that's exactly how you would characterize the Flyers' miserable weekend, which they entered with a chance to overtake the Rangers for the top spot in the Eastern Conference.

But if you just read Tortorella's quote without any context, it would have been impossible to tell whether he was talking about Gaborik's goal or the one Michael Del Zotto fluttered past Bryzgalov just 36 seconds after the Flyers repaid their debt in the first minute of the next period.

Suddenly, the Flyers are looking like Gaborik did after that hit: down for the count against the Rangers. Del Zotto's squeaker propelled the Rangers to a convincing 5-2 victory over the Flyers, which served as an afternoon appetizer to New York's Super Bowl Sunday.

It was the Flyers' sixth straight loss to the Rangers and their fourth this season. They've been outscored, 24-8, in the six games.

"I think everyone looked at the standings before the weekend, knowing if we went 2-for-2 that we'd be at the top of the conference," Scott Hartnell said. "After the [first] 40 minutes we played on Saturday and the disappointing ending today, it's definitely frustrating."

The "rivalry" word was thrown about quite a bit in the Flyers' locker room after the game, one that featured four fights, plenty of bruising hits and at least a pint of blood lost.

Wins, not fights, fuel rivalries.

"It hurts worse," Hartnell said of the punches. "You don't feel as much pain when you win the game."

"They have four wins and we have none," Wayne Simmonds said. "There's not much else you can say about that. We're upset that we haven't beaten them this year."

Yesterday, it came down to the goaltending, as it has so often for the Flyers this season. On two occasions, the Flyers clawed back from one-goal deficits, only to have the Rangers retake the lead with a soft goal. After Del Zotto's goal, the Rangers iced the game with a wrister by Brandon Dubinsky and an empty-netter by Ruslan Fedotenko.

For Bryzgalov, who got the start after pitching a shutout over the final 31 minutes of Saturday's debacle in which Sergei Bobrovsky began by allowing six goals, it was a frustrating turn of events after recent solid play.

Bryzgalov had allowed just nine goals in his previous five starts, a goals-against average of 1.70, and the Flyers had earned at least one point in each of those games.

Yesterday, Bryzgalov termed Gaborik's goal as "unlucky." But that excuse is wearing thin.

"It was a funny bounce, too, because puck hit me in the stick and started climbing my stick [going] over my pads and under the arm," Bryzgalov explained. "Mistakes happen. It's part of the game."

At the other end of the ice, King Henrik Lundqvist allowed two or fewer goals for the 26th time in his 38 appearances this season, as the Rangers left little doubt as to who is the class of the East.

"It's frustrating this team's had our number all year; we fight to tie it up and we make a couple little mistakes and they end up in the back of our net," Matt Read said. "We've got to tighten up as a group and start putting the pucks in right areas and be smart with the puck when we have the opportunities.

"Lundqvist is beatable. He has been playing well. But that's no excuse for not scoring or not playing the game as simple as we can."

Beatable or not, that left a pretty sour taste in the Flyers' locker room.

"We were in a position to win a hockey game. We don't," coach Peter Laviolette said. "We're trying to chase down first in the division, first in the conference, and we're on the short end. It's frustrating."

The Flyers are five points back of New York, and after this weekend the Rangers have two games in-hand.

"I don't think we brought our 'A' game," Brayden Schenn said. "We've got to be better than that. Four points were up for grabs. We came up with zero. I guess that means we owe them one."

Bryzgalov remained bewildered, saying he "didn't know why we didn't get our points."

Tortorella explained easily enough.

The Rangers completed a season sweep of the Flyers at Madison Square Garden . . . Brayden Schenn's breakaway goal out of the penalty box, sprung by Jake Voracek, was his third goal in five games . . . Zac Rinaldo was fined the maximum $5,000 for two separate incidents in Saturday's loss to the Devils . . . Schenn's goal in the second period halted Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist's career-high shutout streak of 182 minutes, 37 seconds.