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Biron, Carter shine as Flyers blow past Hurricanes

Mar 29, 2007 - 5:12 AM PHILADELPHIA (Ticker) -- Martin Biron went out and proved his worth, while the Carolina Hurricanes are proving that maybe they are not a playoff team after all.

Biron was steady in goal and Jeff Carter scored a pair of tallies as the Philadelphia Flyers put a dent in the playoff hopes of the Hurricanes with a 5-1 victory.

The Flyers acquired Biron from the Buffalo Sabres for a second-round pick at the trade deadline on February 27. Eligible to become an unrestricted free agent in July, he instead opted to sign a two-year contract extension with the Flyers on Tuesday.

A day later, he gave Philadelphia a glimpse of what is to come, making 23 saves to help hand Carolina its second lopsided loss in as many days. The Hurricanes (38-31-8) suffered a 6-1 loss at Toronto on Tuesday and entered this one two points out of the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

The Flyers (21-44-11), who have a league-low 53 points, snapped a four-game losing skid.

"I thought the effort was terrific and the blocked shots seem to be a little infectious," Philadelphia coach John Stevens said. "We had a lot of desperation and a lot of pucks that would have been chances but never made it to the net. It was great to see."

Carter opened the scoring in the first period and capped it with an empty-net tally with 33 seconds to play in the final session. It was the second multi-goal effort of the season for Carter, who also added an assist.

Defenseman Derian Hatcher gave the Flyers a 2-0 lead eight minutes into the second period.

With 9:33 left in the session the Hurricanes were awarded a penalty shot after Flyers defenseman Lasse Kukkonen closed his hand on the puck in the crease. Former Flyer Justin Williams took the penalty shot, but Biron made the save, much to the delight of the home crowd.

"You got to do what you got to do. If you take a penalty shot to stop a goal, you do it," Biron said. "There is a chance that you might come out on top. I tried to get a lot of good timing with Williams coming in. I thought that maybe he was going to go blocker. He looked that he might cross over and go blocker, but at the last minute, I got a piece of it with my glove and it stayed out."

"He came and challenged well," Williams said. "The ice was bad and I figured that I was going to shoot right away, and he caught a piece of it." The Hurricanes eventually halved the deficit when Ray Whitney scored his 30th goal of the season with four seconds left in the middle period.

Carolina was unable to build on the momentum, however, as Mike Knuble and blue-liner Braydon Coburn scored 72 seconds apart early in the third to put away the game.

John Grahame made 20 saves for the Hurricanes, who had won three straight before the consecutive lopsided losses.

"We're in a fight to get into the playoffs," Carolina coach Peter Laviolette said. "We needs wins and we need to go on the road and take away points. We took away nothing. We have to go home and have to work hard for the last five games. We need to put a streak together."

The Flyers are not going to the playoffs but could have a say over who does, as they face teams battling for postseason position in each of their six remaining games.

Philadelphia plays New Jersey twice and also meets the New York Rangers, Islanders, Toronto and Buffalo to close out the season. Those teams should expect an effort similar to the one the Flyers gave against the Hurricanes, according to Hatcher.

"We aren't looking at things as if we are playing the spoilers," he said. "We don't want to just roll over and let teams win. We want to go out there and win the games. If it happens that we are spoilers, then that's the way it works out."

"Every team we are playing has a real good possibility to make it to the playoffs, so that is really a test for us," Stevens added. "We are just looking for the type of competitiveness that comes with blocked shots and the type of energy and urgency that we played with tonight."