PHILADELPHIA _ Sometimes things look much better on paper.
When the whiz kids in the Flyers' marketing department conjured up Saturday's Halloween themed arena entertainment sometime this past summer, they couldn't have possibly anticipated that it would blend into what was happening on the ice. The Flyers had finished the previous season strong, had added a big free agent over the summer, and had more goalies than they knew what to do with.
Well, no one was scared much by the marketing department Saturday.
The hockey team?
That was a whole different house of horrors as the Nightmare on Broad Street continued into its 11th game.
Vincent Price's loudspeaker laughter only worked to accentuate the latest Flyers flailing and failing, as they lost, 6-1, to an Islanders team that came into the game firmly entrenched in their own heads. New York had lost four of five games and appeared at least as jittery as the home team at the start of the game, but the harrowing truth of it is there may be no more lost team in the NHL right now than the Philadelphia Flyers (4-7).
"We've got too much going on in between our ears right now," said Flyers coach Dave Hakstol. "And I see that in our game. That's my job to clear some of that out so they can go out and play the game with a clear head. It's really hard to play the game when you have too much going on."
After the first 20 minutes, the Flyers trailed 2-0, marking the 10th time in 11 games this season they have surrendered the first goal. They did this despite being afforded two power plays, despite playing in front of the home crowd.
When you're not getting pucks to the net, that hardly matters. When your best players operate as if recently promoted minor leaguers, that hardly matters. Shayne Gostisbehere, Claude Giroux and Ivan Provorov _ three players known for their puck control _ made some of the most egregious unforced errors in the offensive zone to contribute to the malaise, throwing it blindly to an opponent (Giroux), fanning on a shot (Ghost), over-skating the puck entirely (Provorov).
In his first game of the season, Michal Neuvirth stopped 16 of the 22 shots he faced.
"We get down goals, we go into this hole where we're not clicking and we think the world is going to end," said defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere, who was on the ice for two of New York's six goals. "We've got to get back to the basics. Make the simple plays and the bounces will come."
Said Scott Laughton, "We're cheating for pucks. We're cheating all over the zone, we're hoping the puck gets out of the zone so we can get going, myself included. We've got to move pucks quicker."
After an 0-for-3 Saturday, the Flyers power play has now scored just once in its last 20 tries. This is fragility in full view. Entering the third period down 3-1, the game still salvageable thanks to a goal from Jori Lehtera, they surrendered three straight goals to scare away much of their matinee crowd. Truth is, the crowd has become a little scary these days too, their boos cascading down before a goal for either team had been scored, lustily when that first period and throughout the three incredibly disjointed Flyers power plays.
The Flyers took a flight out west after the game, launching a four-game, eight-day trip that begins Tuesday in Anaheim, offering that embattled coach another opportunity to rid those demons plaguing his team, to clear some heads. It was a similar trip last season in early December in which the Flyers emerged from a similar hole, reversing the effects of a 10-game winless streak with six in a row, launching them into an exhausting run to the playoffs and creating great expectations for the start of this season.
"Everyone's got to take a deep breath, look in the mirror and see what you have to do to get better," Laughton said. "That's what's going to get us out of this."
