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Broad Street Bully: Fans to Flyers owners: Bring back Kate!

Broad Street Bully: My friends, Broad Street Bully needs to discuss a crisis of faith before tonight's Flyers vs. Buffalo game. The Kate Smith statue was sent into storage and hasn't been seen since.

Ed Slivak, center, who used to ask the Kate Smith statue for help before Flyers playoff games, now turns to Flyers Ice Girls Jessica Myers, left, and Kimberly Webb, right, for good luck.
Ed Slivak, center, who used to ask the Kate Smith statue for help before Flyers playoff games, now turns to Flyers Ice Girls Jessica Myers, left, and Kimberly Webb, right, for good luck.Read more

MY FRIENDS, Broad Street Bully needs to discuss a crisis of faith in the Flyers Kate-chism before tonight's tie-breaking Steel Cage Death Match vs. Buffalo:

NO KATE TEMPTS FATE? Before the Spectrum went ka-boom, the Kate Smith statue was sent into storage and hasn't been seen since.

Flyers fans who placed bouquets in her arms and at her feet, and talked with her before last year's Stanley Cup playoff games, miss her terribly.

Ed Slivak, a lifelong die-hard who always asked for Kate's playoff guidance in 2010, has taken to cuddling - I mean, huddling - with Flyers Ice Girls during pregame block parties at the Wells Fargo Center.

"The girls seem to be the help that the Flyers need," Slivak told Broad Street Bully. He said it seriously. So I refrained from shouting, "Ed, you lucky dog! Woohoo!"

But for equally fervent Flyers fan Janet Wojnarowski, the Ice Girls are no substitute for Kate.

Wojnarowski spent more than $400 on flowers for Kate during last year's finals - and darn near channeled us a Cup.

She was so distraught over not being able to continue her pregame ritual this year, she emailed Ed Snider, chairman of Comcast Spectacor - which owns the Wells Fargo Center and the Flyers - and asked if the Kate Smith statue could be set up at the center for these playoffs.

"I told him I believe Kate's statue should be at the Broad Street doors, welcoming fans and gracing the outside with some character," Wojnarowski told Bully. "He said he would take that into consideration."

She started a Facebook page called "Bring the Kate Smith Statue Home to the Wells Fargo Center" and got hundreds of thumbs-ups from fans who agree.

"I feel that if Facebook can get Betty White to host 'Saturday Night Live,' " Wojnarowski said, "then Facebook can get Kate Smith to where she belongs."

Yesterday, Broad Street Bully asked Comcast Spectacor's Ike Richman whether Kate would show up outside a Flyers playoff game any time soon, and was told, "We physically can't do it."

Richman said that Kate will reappear at Philly Live, the new restaurant/entertainment complex planned for the Spectrum site, when it opens next April.

COLD CUP OF PUCK: Pat and Teresa Smart - Delaware County die-hards now living in Cecil County, Md. - will be in their usual Section 107, Row 1 seats tonight, hoping that flying pucks land in the seats, not in the beer.

"We watch the game through the goalie's eyes," Pat wrote Bully. "The ever-popular Sign Man sits directly behind us. The Flyers shoot twice at our end."

During the last game of the 2010 Stanley Cup Finals, an airborne puck landed near the Smarts and fellow die-hard Jon Ostroff, who sits next to Teresa.

"We were all searching for that puck," Pat said, "until we realized, it had landed in Jon's beer."

GOT FLYERS? Send your Flyers family stories and photos to

bully@phillynews.com.