WINNIPEG - James van Riemsdyk twirled in the neutral zone, even on one leg at one point, as he curled around a Jets defender and nearly fumbled the puck twice before breaking the blue line.
Still nearly 100 feet from Ondrej Pavelec, van Riemsdyk navigated around the boards as the time remaining on the Flyers' season series with Winnipeg slowly whittled down to zero, before shoveling off a last-second prayer toward Wayne Simmonds.
Apparently, there is a Hockey God. He resides in the True North.
Simmonds somehow dumped a one-timer behind Pavelec with 9.7 seconds remaining in regulation and Jaromir Jagr erased the Flyers' three periods of frustration with an overtime winner 4:16 into the extra session, 5-4. It was the Flyers' first win over Winnipeg this season after three losses.
For the first 59 minutes and 50 seconds, the contest featured exactly what the Flyers have seen over the last few weeks: a bazillion bullets fired toward the opposition with little results, three power-play goals against, and more shoddy play from Ilya Bryzgalov.
Despite it all, they escaped with the two points to avoid falling into sixth place in the Eastern Conference.
"I really liked our game," coach Peter Laviolette said. "I'm really proud that the guys kept coming, kept pumping. You know, it was one of those gutsy efforts that you look back on. It might be one of our best, toughest wins of the year, to keep fighting and to keep pushing to get the two points."
Until van Riemsdyk's dish to Simmonds, the game looked like a disaster.
And for Bryzgalov, the nightmare started right after the puck dropped, as the 15,004 Winnipeg fans in the loud-and-cozy MTS Centre mocked him repeatedly with "Il-ya, Il-ya, Il-ya" chants.
That intensified thoughout the game - like when Bryzgalov whiffed on a high floater from the next universe in the third period that gave Evander Kane his 23rd goal of the season and the Jets a 4-3 lead.
Rather than being thankful he was bailed out like a Wall Street bank, Bryzgalov said he enjoyed the "support," juxtaposing Winnipeg's fans against Philly.
"I like it,"' Bryzgalov said. "It was a great atmosphere. I realized, every building is going to support me like here. It was nice to hear cheering, 'Il-ya, Il-ya.' I never heard that before, anywhere.
"When 15,000 people support you, it's very impressive. Here, they were cheering. In Philly, they boo me."
