Broad Street Bully: Euphoria in Flyerland

MARCH YOUR Penguins back home, Pittsburgh, and from your series loss to Philadelphia, take this lesson: Flightless birds shouldn't puck with the Flyers.

From Claude Giroux's first goal just 32 seconds into the game to Brayden Schenn's final tally just seconds from the end, the orange and black clicked like clockwork on Sunday, even if the old ultraviolence seen earlier in the series was lacking.

Flyers fans at the Wells Fargo Center worked like a well-oiled machine, too - pulsing in unison, chanting as one and blowing their lids when the team finally secured the opening round of the Eastern Conference in Game 6.

"I am awesome!" said Tonya Boggs, whose face seemed too small for her smile. "I am so happy!"

Boggs, 45, of Atlanta, is a season-ticketholder from the Peach State who told Broad Street Bully that she makes the 800-mile trek four or five times a month during the regular and postseason.

She left her home on a farm in Georgia at 4 a.m. yesterday and was scheduled to leave Philadelphia on a 7:30 p.m. flight back. She came alone and left her husband - who works for Delta Air Lines - at home.

"Someone has to pay for me to come," she said.

Eli Ingram, 7, didn't have to pay to go to Sunday's game, not with cash anyway, but he did have to make a deal with his die-hard dad, Fred, 36, of Gloucester City, N.J.

"If he painted himself orange, he got to come to the game. That was the deal," said Fred Ingram, a season-ticketholder.

And so he did. Eli Ingram wore only Flyers pajama pants and a Scott Hartnell wig. The rest of him - from head to shirtless torso to toe - was covered in orange paint, giving the impression that Willy Wonka may have drafted Hartnell to team Oompa Loompa.

"It was tough with the rain but we brought a big umbrella," said Fred Ingram, of trying to preserve his son's living art.

Eli Ingram high-fived passers-by, many of whom wiped their hands afterward to get rid of the orange paint, and broke out some mad dance moves in the concourse.

Blond beauty Mikayla Hights, of Hatboro, also broke out some mad moves in the concourse, but hers were with a hockey stick.

Hights hit the jackpot Sunday, when the Flyers' Erik Gustafsson and Eric Wellwood both gave her their hockey sticks after the game.

How'd she snag the priceless souvenirs that made Broad Street Bully jealous? Well, it was her birthday - her second birthday - and she played that up for all it was worth.

Hights and her family sat just three rows behind from the Flyers' bench, and the players probably wanted to show their appreciation to her for being far more mature than Sidney Crosby.

Hights' dad, Michael, 36, said he planned to decorate his daughter's room with the sticks. "There are no words for how I feel right now," said Michael Hights. "I knew they were going to come in to kick ass, and that is what they did."