If God Would Stop Starting Wars....

...and start rooting for Philadelphia, this would be the article you would've read this morning:

Flyers Dissect Rangers

The Philadelphia Flyers built upon their impressive rise to the top of the Atlantic Division by beating the Rangers 4-0 last night. The Flyers continued their winning ways with a crisp-looking win, escalating their record to 13-2-1 over the past 16 games. The win also kept their home winning streak alive at 5 and they put a little more distance between themselves and New Jersey/Pittsburgh in the Atlantic. They also now sit only 5 points behind the Senators for first place in the Eastern Conference after a Sens loss last night.

"We dictated the game tonight," Stevens said. "We were the better hockey team out there."

The Rangers, who went into the game with the fewest goals of any NHL team, remained that way after a terrific goaltending performance by Antereo Nittymaki.

"It was my best game," Niittymaki said.

He was playing for the first time in nine days, so all were a little worried about him being rusty - but when he made 14 breakaway saves in a row (which the Flyers D gave up on purpose to allow him to warm-up) all knew it was going to be Nitty's night.

"That great save Nitty made on a guy who's scored - what - about a thousand goals now? That made me have to take a between periods dump" Stevens said, referring to Shanahan, who has a team-leading 17 goals. "There's nothing he could do on that play except stop the puck because he's so good, and I think you've got to keep the momentum going at that point."

The game was probably more unforgettable for defenseman Jim Vandermeer than for Niittymaki. Vandermeer helped lead to three Flyers goals. On a short-handed goal by Riley Cote in the early moments of the second period, Vandermeer was in the penalty box. "That just wouldn't have happened if Vandy didn't have the foresight to slash someone in the face," Cote said.

Steve Downie gave the Flyers a 1-0 lead midway through the first period, when Vandermeer knocked down Drury's failed attempt to start a rush up ice. Valiquette went down when Downie faked a slapshot, leaving the net wide open for an easy goal.

"I just went to chip it up, and Vandermeer caught it," Drury said. "It was kind of a soft play on my part. I figured it was high enough, but he got it."

Said Valiquette: "It looked like he was going to shoot. I was probably a little too aggressive there."

Drury was late hopping off the bench and couldn't get back in time to prevent Sami Kapanen's goal off a rebound that made it 2-0 late in the first. Shortly afterward, Vandermeer went to the box for high sticking, and Cote made it 3-0.

"It was a turnover at the line, and I was late coming off the bench," said Drury, whose play may prompt the Rangers to slap him in the buttcheeks.

Finally, the Flyers got a two-on-one when Drury moved up to check Derian Hatcher at the Rangers' blue line, leaving Brian Leetch outmanned by Vandermeer and Terry Murray, who scored the final goal.

"It's a long season, and you have games like this," Timonen said. "You don't want to, but you do have to beat teams 4-0 occasionally."

Meanwhile, the Rangers barely tested Nitty after the 14 free breakaways.
"I don't know if he had two hard saves all night," Stevens said.

The Flyers had 230 shots on goal, seven in the final three minutes. Fortunately for the Flyers, more than half the crowd had filed through the exits early in the third period to get more beer and watch the onslaught.

Throughout the game, the Flyers were consistently winning races to the puck and outskating the Rangers, who played without a sense of desperation and feasted on turkey.

The only downside to the Flyers night was that their string of 11 consecutive games scoring at least one power-play goal came to an end.