Meltdown 1 of ?: The Sabres whomp the Flyers

This topic makes it as good a time as ever to look for some voices outside my own, because this is the only instance that truly comes to mind. And honestly due to game coverage, these games are only burned into my memory because of the shocking nature of the defeats.

But man, oh man was this a meltdown. You know when the term might not quite be hyperbole when a good coach gets fired.

To be fair to the Flyers, there were three games that were nowhere near brutal. The Flyers managed to win two games and lose one in OT.

At the time, this series seemed to spark the arrival of the Sabres: an 8-2 win on Game 2, a 3-0 shutout in Game 5 and a 7-1 pounding in the deciding Game 6. For non-math majors out there, that means in the two most important games of that season the Flyers got blown out 10-1. In that Game 6, the Sabres outscored the Flyers 3-0 in the first period; 3-1 in the second period; 1-0 in the third. That's about as close as I could think of to being a parallel game.

Oddly, the Philadelphia team was on the other end in this one. It's underscored an intriguing mini-trend in sports: the other huge metropolitan areas (outside of NYC) going from gloom to bloom. It happened for Boston starting with the Patriots to the Red Sox all the way back to the Celtics. Could it be happening in a Phillies - Eagles - Flyers pattern?

I sure fucking hope not.