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Laviolette takes blame for losses

In the shadow of yesterday's 7-0 shellacking at Madison Square Garden, Flyers coach Peter Laviolette shined the spotlight of blame on himself.

The Flyers did not practice today in order to revive their tired legs and slumping spirits.

Laviolette observed that the lack of energy in the worst loss of the season should be directly attributed to the Flyers' recent workload. Following a 4-1 clunker against Ottawa, Laviolette put his players through three days of grueling workouts in preparation for a March push of 15 games in 29 days, a strategy the coach hopes will pay dividends as his team top-seeded club enters the playoffs.

The three practices preceded three games in four days, two of them day games, all of them losses. The Flyers also practiced briefly but vigorously on Friday.

It didn't help that several members of the team were battling a flu bug at the time.

"I have to take one hundred percent responsibility for what happened yesterday," Laviolette said, referring to the loss, which ran the Flyers' losing streak to a season-high four games.

Laviolette said he expects the team to be "great" tomorrow night when Edmonton visits.

He also said that he does not expect any major line shakeups, including the once incendiary line of Danny Briere, Ville Leino and Scott Hartnell.

"The easy thing to do is blow everything up," Laviolette said. "I believe in that line."