Flyers eliminate Sabres with 5-2 win in Game 7

Earlier in this grueling Eastern Conference quarterfinal series, Flyers captain Mike Richards said the officials were letting the Buffalo Sabres get away with "murder."

Tuesday night, before a percolating crowd at the Wells Fargo Center, the Flyers killed the Sabres' season. With their 5-2 victory, they won the series, four games to three.

The Flyers now move into the conference semifinals. They will meet one of three teams: Boston, Pittsburgh, or Tampa Bay.

Defenseman Braydon Coburn, of all people, scored with 19 seconds left in the first period to snap a scoreless tie and set the rout in motion.

Danny Briere, arguably the series' best player, had a goal and an assist for the Flyers, who broke the game open on second-period power-play goals by Briere and James van Riemsdyk.

Briere called Coburn's goal, which deflected off Buffalo's Mike Grier, the game's turning point.

"We barely let them come into our zone in most of the first period - and it was still 0-0 at that point," said Briere, who set up the first two goals by winning faceoffs from Paul Gaustad. "So to get a little deflection, and see the puck go in, that was a huge relief and a huge momentum swing coming back into the room."

One of the members of the Flyers' "Three Stooges" goalie rotation - Brian "Curly" Boucher - made 26 saves and raised his record to 4-1 in the series.

Boucher's counterpart, Ryan Miller, was pulled after Ville Leino scored with 18 minutes, 1 second left, giving the Flyers a 4-0 lead.

It had been 11 years since Boucher last played in a Game 7, and the Flyers tried to make it easy on him this time as they kept the puck in the Sabres' end for most of the first period.

The Flyers had a 16-2 shots advantage in the opening period, and the play was that lopsided. Buffalo seemed to be playing a prevent defense and relying on Miller to steal his third 1-0 win of the series.

Miller was brilliant, but the Flyers finally broke through when Coburn's soft point shot deflected off Grier's glove, dipped down, and went through the goalie's legs with 19 seconds left in the opening period.

To add insult, Briere tapped his former teammate and good buddy, Miller, on the head after the puck went into the net.

"Just caught up in the moment," Briere said.

After Claude Giroux (two assists) was thrown out of the faceoff circle, Briere set up the goal by sending the draw back to Coburn.

Said Coburn, who had two goals in the regular season and none in the series until that shot: "I just tried to get to the middle and put it on net. Luckily, it went in."

While the Flyers were on a power play, Briere, Mr. Postseason, made it 2-0 by scoring on a rebound after Richards' shot bounced off him with 15:15 left in the second period. It was Briere's sixth goal of the series, tops on both teams.

The Flyers' power play, which was abysmal before Chris Pronger returned as its quarterback in Game 6, struck again as Giroux took a shot from the left wing, and van Riemsdyk tipped it past Miller with 9:41 remaining in the second.

That ignited a singsong "Mil-ler" chant and made the Flyers 2 for 2 on the power play for the night and 3 for 8 (37.5 percent) in the two games since Pronger returned.

Before that, they were 2 for 26 (7.7 percent) in the series.

Through the first two periods, Boucher was flawless. He made a handful of difficult stops in the second period, when Buffalo got out of its defensive shell.

Leino made it 4-0, scoring from a sharp angle from the top of the left circle with 18:01 left in the game.

Exit Miller.

An orange-clad fan held up a sign: "It's NOT Miller time."

Reaching the Stanley Cup Finals last year with most of the same players, Briere said, gave the Flyers confidence that they could overcome a 3-2 series deficit against Buffalo.

"I think our experience really showed," he said. "It's no secret that we've played a lot of really big games in the last year."

Boucher had all four wins in the series, which started with Sergei Bobrovsky as the Flyers' No. 1 goalie.

"Resiliency is an understatement for him," Richards said. "He made a ton of huge saves at times we needed him to."

Richards said the crowd - extra loud from the opening faceoff - played a part in the win.

"When you walked out there, you had goose bumps just listening to them," he said. "That's what we played the whole season for, to have the home crowd behind you in a Game 7."