The Philadelphia Flyers entered their Eastern Conference Quarter-Finals playoff series against the Pittsburgh Penguins expecting a bloody battle. They certainly got that, while also partaking in one of the more wild postseason offensive contests in National Hockey League history.

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The Philadelphia Flyers 3-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Playoff Quarter-Finals wasn't a positive outcome, but at least it was a normal game.

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The Penguins finally finished off a game in impressive fashion, but it's just a blip if they don't complete the improbable comeback.

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We covered almost all of these incidents in our post on the Philadelphia Flyers' Game 3 victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins, but this compendium of hits, fights and cheap shots from alander94 on YouTube really does bring home how [expletive] insane the nastiness was in this game: Sidney Crosby: For the last time, not a goody two-shoes. As was previously reported Monday, the NHL will have Arron Asham and James Neal answer for their actions in Monday hearings — Neal, in fact, will have two of them. Asham has been offered an in-person hearing Tuesday morning for his match penalty for cross-checking Brayden Schenn at 14:15 of the first period. Asham received a match penalty on the hit. Neal's hearings focus on the hit against Sean Couturier in the third period, as well as the charging penalty he received for a hit on Claude Giroux later in the period. Neal was not penalized on the Couturier hit. There are three themes coming out of this mess for the Penguins, heading into Game 4.

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The Pittsburgh Penguins came under fire in the weeks leading up to the playoffs. First, there was the Peter Laviolette incident, where the Flyers bench boss accused Penguins coach Dan Bylsma of putting out his checking line to injure his players, nearly jumping the glass to scream at him. Then, there was the John Torterella incident, where the Rangers head coach blasted the Penguins organization as being one of the "most arrogant organizations in the league."

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Hello, this is a feature that will run through the entire season and aims to recap the weekend's events and boils those events down to one admittedly superficial fact or stupid opinion about each team. Feel free to complain about it. It has never once been said that hockey pundits are ones to give up their long-held beliefs. Things like wins still matter a lot when it comes to Vezina voting, people still believe most careers were failures unless the player won a Stanley Cup, and the idea that a player can be "clutch" is still valued more than anything else once the postseason rolls around. Case in point: Marc-Andre Fleury. All we heard in the run-up to the playoffs was that the Flyers and Penguins were more or less each others' equals as far as the forwards and defense were concerned, and that the difference was in net. Ilya Bryzgalov: Fragile goalie. Marc-Andre Fleury: Big-game goalie. The Penguins, therefore, would win this series, even if it wouldn't be easy. And now we sit here, nine-plus periods of hockey having been played between these two bitter rivals, and Fleury has been nothing short of shambolic. The stats don't speak for themselves so much as they roar from the mountaintops that this is a goaltender who's in so far over his head that the Roberto Luongo who faced the Blackhawks those few times looks as mentally secure as Fort Knox by comparison. As netminders go, Fleury has been the worst in these playoffs by several country miles. He's the only one to start all three games and not earn a win (that's for all you old-schoolers out there). The worst save percentage of anyone. Worst goals-against average of anyone. ( Coming Up: Pekka Rinne is OK; James Neal is a punk; the Blues bench breaks; a way to get PK Subban to Edmonton; Bruins stars invisible vs. Capitals; Tortorella doesn't go crazy; huge off-season for Colorado; why Brent Sutter left; will Jackets go for Murray at No. 2?; Wild, Fletcher work on deal; Claude Noel's odd conversation with fan; Mike Green doesn't feel well; and why Canada's getting ready to cry.)

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The Philadelphia Flyers expected this first round playoff series against the Pittsburgh Penguins to be physically tough and it has been. Generally a contest of that type would be closely played and result in a 2-1 series lead favoring one team. Not so in this case.

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The Philadelphia Flyers' 6-4 victory on April 1 over the Pittsburgh Penguins featured an extended brawl with just over a minute left in regulation that resulted in both coaches screaming at each other over the glass.

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No. 1 Star: Sidney Crosby, Pittsburgh Penguins Pittsburgh rebounded from two straight losses to the New York Islanders with a 5-3 win over the Buffalo Sabres. Crosby continued racking up points with a goal and three assists to bring his season total to 29 points in 18 games. In the process, Crosby became the seventh youngest player in NHL history to surpass the 600-point mark. Steve Sullivan chipped in three points and Evgeni Malkin recorded two, bringing his goal total to 48 and points total to 102 on the season. Pascal Dupuis had two helpers to increase his NHL-best points streak to 13 games. No. 2 Star: Nikita Nikitin, Columbus Blue Jackets The Blue Jackets played spoiler on Friday denying the Florida Panthers a chance to move closer to the Southeast Division title with a 4-1 win. Nikitin scored twice and assisted on another and R.J.Umberger tallied two goals to send the Panthers to their sixth loss in their last eight road games. Allen York made 30 shots for his second straight win. No. 3 Star: Semyon Varlamov, Colorado Avalanche Making his seventh straight start, Varlamov snapped a four-game losing streak by with 38 saves backstopping the Avs to a 4-1 win over the Calgary Flames. Four different Avs scored to keep them in the mix for one of the bottom playoff spots in the Western Conference.

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No. 1 Star: Sidney Crosby, Pittsburgh Penguins Pittsburgh rebounded from two straight losses to the New York Islanders with a 5-3 win over the Buffalo Sabres. Crosby continued racking up points with a goal and three assists to bring his … Continue reading ?

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