What do the Bruins need to need to do to close out the Flyers in Game 4 at the Wachovia Center on Friday?

Exactly what they have been doing.

There is a sense around the Bruins right now that nothing can really knock them off their game. They have not been rampaging through the playoffs, but they are playing with enough determination that the wins just keep on coming. It is like Boston has been doing a balancing act on the blade of a knife — a little slip and this would be a whole different story.

The B's did not have Marc Savard through the quarterfinals and the Sabres outplayed them for significant portions of the series, but Tuukka Rask and the defense took care of business. They will be without David Krejci after the center dislocated his wrist on a hit by Mike Richards in Game 3. Different missing center, same situation.

The Bruins need to keep their razor focus on Friday even with the 3-0 series lead. Against Buffalo they had a chance to close the series out in Game 5 at HSBC Arena but came out with clunker and had to go back to Boston to win it in six at TD Garden. Boston would not like a repeat performance this time around.

What the Bruins did well in Game 3 — keep the lanes open in front of Rask, pinch on the walls and back-check well — will be what will serve them well in Game 4. Rask has proven time and again that if he can see the puck, he can stop the puck. He is almost an acrobatic robot while following the puck and putting himself in great crease position to make the save. It has been fun to watch for B's fans mostly because he takes a lot of drama out of the game. The puck comes in the crease and he sits on it. The puck flies through traffic and he gloves it. Rebounds come off his pads and he snuffs out the comebacks. It is an exercise in futility for the Flyers, and as Game 3 wore on they started to realize it. Every save Rask made, a little air slipped out of Wachovia Center to the point that it was almost silent in the last 10 minutes of the third period and basically empty for the last three. 

That will be pivotal in Game 4. If Boston comes out and score a couple of quick goals, the Broad Street faithful may very well pack it in. Once the fans are out of the game, the team will be quick to follow. 

Philadelphia could get a boost from a surprise source on Friday. Simon Gagne, who had toe surgery on April 23 and was expected to miss at least three weeks, participated in Philadelphia's skate on Thursday at the Flyers practice facility in Vorhees, N.J. Gagne is a big scorer and almost has the ability to have an almost Mark Teixeira impact on the Flyers lineup. He lengthens the lines the way an on-base percentage guy in baseball makes a lineup longer. Teixeira is like a Gordian Knot in the middle of the Yankees lineup, Gagne is the same.

A Gordian Knot cannot be untied. No reason to bother trying. The way to get around it is to just cut the rope above the knot. For the Bruins, that would mean hoping that Gagne is not present at all, because with him playing well, the Bruins just do not match up against Philadelphia's top lines. Better that he is not present at all.

None of it may matter anyway. Rask is the X-factor, and Flyers coach Peter Laviolette said repeatedly after Game 3 that the Flyers outplayed Boston only to get stomped on by the backstop. Now, Laviolette senses the end as much as the Bruins do and hence he is prone to exaggeration. Philadelphia did outplay Boston for stretches of Game 3, but it was not a full 60 minutes of hockey. The Flyers did not take an entire period off but did take significant portions of each period off, usually after a dominating stretch that was extinguished by Rask. The Bruins with their newfound confidence and sharp focus stayed within coach Claude Julien’s scheme and won it where it matters — on the scoreboard. Really, if that is total dominance by the Flyers, then I want what he is drinking.

So, it comes back down to the Bruins and the series keys — continue good special teams play (Flyers have not had a power-play goal in the last two games), clear out the lanes and the crease for Rask, and be opportunistic around the net. It is a simple recipe, and Boston ultimately is a simple team. It just happens to be a simple team playing its best hockey of the season.