Troy Brouwer.

BY MARK SPECTOR
sportsnet.ca

PHILADELPHIA — Chicago’s Troy Brouwer has dreamed of an opportunity like this since he was a kid growing up outside Vancouver.

Now, he’ll awake from an afternoon nap with a chance to actually win a Stanley Cup, the dream of almost every kid who grows up in our country.

"I remember watching the Vancouver-New York Rangers series in ’94. Of course, I was cheering for Vancouver back then. That was the team I had the most invested in," he said. "Now, there’s a chance you can win the Stanley Cup. You’ve got to try to forget about that."

Yeah, right. And how are you going to accomplish that?

"That’s the thing," admits Brouwer, who has never won a championship at any level on his way up to the NHL. "This is new to me. But there are lots of guys in here who have won. John Madden, Andrew Ladd, Tomas Kopecky… I’m sure there will be a lot of talk about that in here tonight about how to act, what to do to finish this thing off tonight."

•••

Flying Dangerously

Of course, we don’t have to remind you that a situation like this one is right in the Flyers’ wheel house. They may not have been ready to seize control of this series in Game 5, coming out with their worst effort of the series.

But staving off elimination? They invented that, man.

"This isn’t the first time," points out winger Simon Gagne. "It’s been like this all year for us."

Well, at least all spring.

"This is the same as against Boston," he said. "But with a Stanley Cup at the end."

Just in case however, word is coach Peter Laviolette has a video in store for his Flyers this afternoon when they return to the rink. You just know it will be a highlight reel of all the great moments that got the Flyers this far.

"I think motivation is a part of it," Laviolette admitted. "I think guys need to go out on the ice in the right frame of mind. Motivation, I think, is part of the coach's job."

•••

Stanley in the House

When they start bringing big Stanley into the building, everything changes. There is something intrinsically different about a hockey player’s day when he awakes knowing that, before he goes to bed that night, he could me a Stanley Cup champion.

So, like Brouwer, they try and pretend it’s just another game. Good luck with that, Tomas Kopecky.

"I'm just going to prepare the same way I prepare for every other game, and maybe pay a little bit more attention to the details," Kopecky said. "You can't look ahead way too much in front of you. Just focus on the little things and the little battles. That's when the big things are going to come."

Not so fast, say the Flyers. It is their last home game of the year, regardless of the outcome. Watching the Hawks dance the Cup around Wachovia Center isn’t something Jeff Carter pictured when he set out on this mission.

"You never want to see a team come into your building beat you, let alone win the Stanley Cup on your home ice," he said. "Obviously, the fans have been behind us since we began this five years ago, really. It would be nice to come out and get a big win for them in the last home game."

•••

Fair to Middling

Even Philadelphia winger Ville Leino, a teammate of Mike Leighton and a buddy of fellow Finn Antti Niemi, will admit that the goaltending in this series has not been memorable.

"Both goalies have been pretty much the same," Leino said. "They’ve been a little shaky, but still they’ve been playing OK. I don’t think the goalie has mattered so far. We scored four goals last game — you should win a hockey game with four goals, especially in the final."

Leighton gets the start in Game 6 for Philly, as expected. It’s not like the Flyers have much of a choice, even though he’s been yanked twice in the final, Game 1 and Game 5.

"There’s a lot of speed and a lot of offence," he said of the series. "We have four lines that can score and they have four lines that can score. Sometimes, it doesn’t matter how good defence you’re playing, guys are going to make good plays and score goals. It’s not like New Jersey, where they try to play a shutdown system and win 1-0. It’s a good quick series."

•••

Devil in Details

John Madden won a Cup with New Jersey, and he now finds himself as the fourth-line den mother of a group of young Blackhawks who are learning how to win. When he was a kid in New Jersey, Madden learned the same thing from guys like Scott Stevens, Ken Daneyko and Randy McKay.

"I think I'm still feeling my way around," he said. "There's so much leadership in the room. The guys are young, but way beyond their years in terms of the way they handle themselves. Speaking from Jonathan Toews and Dunks (Duncan Keith) and Sharpy (Patrick Sharp), those guys are our captains. (Keith) Seabrook as well. There are lots of leaders in the room that do a lot of things. It's been easy to come in and play hockey and not worry about all the other things that go on.

How often does he stand up to speak?

"I tend to say things in the dressing room when things aren't going so well," Madden said. "So I've had very little to say this year."

•••

Forget it, Pal.

While media and fans go on endlessly about a Flyers team that, like Freddie Krueger, seems impossible to finally lay to rest, they won’t be dwelling on that inside the Philadelphia dressing room prior to Game 6.

"(Boston) was last series. We’re not going to dwell in the past," said defenceman Braydon Coburn, who won’t even take solace in the fact that last year Pittsburgh did exactly what the Flyers are hoping to do here — win Games 6 and 7.

"We don’t draw from the past, other teams in different situations," Coburn said. "We’re not going to sit back and say, ‘Detroit did it, we did it. It’s going to be easy.’ It’s not.

"In here, we’re just worried about the job at hand. It’s winning Game 6 in our building, and coming out with a better effort than Game 5."