It’s early May and the Philadelphia Flyers are still playing hockey!

With victories over division champions Washington and Montreal, the Flyers have advanced to the conference finals and look like a team that could win it all. Of course, all four of the remaining teams look like they could win it all. None of the NHL’s final four lucked their way into victories, as Detroit, Dallas, and Pittsburgh each handily disposed of their opponents thus far.

In my New Year’s predictions column back in December, I wrote, “The Flyers will make some noise in the playoffs this year, but they’ll fall in the second round because they’re still far too young and inconsistent to seriously compete for a Stanley Cup.”

Well I sure am glad I was wrong!

As the Flyers prepare to square off against their cross-state rivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins, they are still too inconsistent in their play late in games, but so far, it hasn’t buried them. The Flyers have let too many leads disappear in their 12 playoff games, some of which turned into losses, other times, they held on for a victory but turned some of my hair prematurely gray.

So how are the Flyers winning in the playoffs after three months of unbelievably lackluster play?

Back in March, I pondered why the Flyers were floundering as the season was winding down. In that column, I determined that three fundamental problems were keeping the Flyers grounded: Martin Biron’s allowing soft goals in net, the lack of a game-changing goal scorer, and injuries.

Through two rounds of the playoffs, Biron has still allowed the occasional soft goal, but he’s made more amazing saves in the last 12 games than I saw from him during the entire regular season. He’s eighth in the NHL in goals against average, which puts him squarely in the middle of the pack, but you have to take into account the fact that the Flyers are constantly shorthanded. (I’m going to wait until two weeks from now when the Flyers have been jobbed out of a spot in the Stanley Cup finals to completely rip the NHL, its league office in Toronto, and the playoff officiating crews for the blatant anti-Philly bias they have displayed during the playoffs.) While statistically, Biron has played worse in the playoffs than the regular season, he has erased the “Oh [shoot]!” factor. Now when teams enter the Flyers’ zone, I don’t feel a sense of dread come over me, as if the puck is destined for the back of the net. After standing on his head for at least half of the playoff games so far, Biron has me feeling pretty confident that he’ll make the big save and send the Flyers back the other way on offense. Just for the record, Robert Esche, Sean Burke, John Vanbiesbrouck, Garth Snow and Roman Cechmanek had very high “Oh [shoot]” factors.

One of the biggest problems the Flyers had during the season was their lack of a sniper on offense. In the playoffs, one player can get hot and carry a team a few games and push them into the next round.

Against the Capitals, Danny Briere was that player. He carried the team with six goals, almost all of which were momentum changing tallies. Without a doubt, the mid-season addition of Vaclav Prospal has changed Briere from a pass-first center into a shoot first, opportunistic goal scorer.Against the Canadiens (did you ever notice that they spell Canadiens wrong?), R.J. Umberger did his best Mario Lemieux impression, scoring an amazing eight goals in five games, after scoring just 13 goals in 74 games during the regular season.

The biggest surprise of the playoffs so far is how healthy the Flyers have been (knock on wood wherever you are as you read this!). With the exception of the Mike Knuble hamstring injury, which he returned from in five games, the Flyers have been very healthy, which is never the case when they get to the playoffs.

During the season, the Flyers were crippled by injuries. Mike Richards missed nine games, Joffrey Lupul missed 26, Scottie Upshall missed 21, R.J Umberger missed eight, Derian Hatcher missed 38, and Simon Gagne missed 57. That many injuries to key players at the same time usually does cost a team a few points in the standings. That begs the question, with a little better health, could the Flyers have picked up a few extra points and been in the top half of the conference, making this playoff run a little less surprising.

Prediction time: As we head into the conference finals, I’m feeling pretty good, but not too good. I’ve been on record for a while as thinking that Pittsburgh’s center Evgeni Malkin is best player in the NHL, and with how often the Flyers have been penalized (still not writing about the officiating) in the playoffs, I’m terrified of seeing Malkin, Sydney Crosby, Marian Hossa and Sergei Gonchar on the Pittsburgh power play.

So as much as I’d love to pick the Flyers, they have burned me too many times in my 23 years, and I just can’t see them winning this series. There are too many things that can go wrong. What if the Martin Biron from the regular season returns? What about the defense?It’s been spectacular so far, but as high as I am on Ryan Parent, who has been a healthy scratch for much of the playoffs, the Flyers defense is just one injury away from being blown apart again (see: Tampa Bay, May 2004) while facing a very dangerous offense. When is Crosby going to explode with a flurry of goals? Why can’t we get one lousy call to go our way? I mean seriously! How is it not high sticking when a player smacks the puck down with his stick, then the stick hits the crossbar? The officials would have to be complete morons or just hate the Flyers to allow that goal to stand in the first game against Montreal!

Sorry, but I had to rant just a little about the officiating.

Penguins in 7. (I hope I’m wrong!)