By DAVID SHOALTS, Toronto Globe and Mail

MONTREAL - .The Philadelphia Flyers talked a lot about not letting the Montreal Canadiens get off to an explosive start and not letting them create traffic in front of the Philly net.

Going into Game 3 of the Eastern Conference final Thursday night, the Flyers also said, more than once, that saying it was one thing. Doing it was another.

On a deadline day that lacked excitement, at least as far as big names were concerned, the focus was on the NHL's losers rather than the winners.

The key to a good run in the NHL playoffs is not how many games you win down the stretch in the regular season, but how well you are playing.

The National Hockey League's efforts to put at least some curbs on fighting and hits to the head could disappear in a nasty partisan brawl come June.

Call it "Bettmanomics."
The NHL commissioner was at it again Wednesday, telling a bunch of business folk here that the NHL is just fine, even if the economy isn't, the Phoenix Coyotes are not going to collapse, league revenue is up to record levels, television ratings are up, sponsors are fighting each other to get aboard and so on.

Solving the National Hockey League's problem of hits to the head requires a varied approach because, unlike fighting or hits from behind, it is not a black-and-white issue.