There's no two ways about it: The loss of Ian Laperriere for the remainder of the playoffs hurts every bit as much as the losses of Jeff Carter and Simon Gagne. Over the course of the season, even when the club was struggling for wins, you could count on Ian Laperriere to play the game the right way.

The team is going to miss his forechecking presence, physical play, toughness and two-way grit. None of the youngsters who might take his place in the lineup can deliver all the elements he brings to the lineup. I suppose Jon Kalinski is the leading candidate to start, as Stefan Legein has not yet played an NHL game and it would be tough to throw a player into the playoff pressure cooker with the team already down three regular starting forwards.

****

Once the Flyers' second round opponent (Washington or Boston) becomes clear later tonight, I will post my thoughts on the series matchup tomorrow here at Hockeybuzz.

Today's Daily Drop at Versus.com discusses how the Detroit Red Wings' playoff experience enabled the club to prevail in convincing fashion in last night's Game 7 against Phoenix.

This week's Across the Pond column at NHL.com will be posted later today. The article looks at the various champions and league leaders around the top European leagues. With a victory today, Finland's TPS Turku will win the championship. All the other major Euro league playoffs are finished. HV 71 won the Swedish title, AK Bars Kazan won the KHL championship, SC Bern won the Swiss title, HC Pardubice won the Czech championship behind a stellar playoff from Dominik Hasek, HC Kosice won the Slovak title and the Hannover Scorpions won the title in Germany's DEL.

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