VOORHEES, N.J. – Coach Peter Laviolette likened it to a situation Phillies pitchers Cliff Lee and Cole Hamels are all too familiar with.

“Bryz has done a really nice job in net for us,” Laviolette said. “It’s like a pitcher that goes out on the mound and doesn’t get the run support he needs to win a game. I feel like there’s some areas that we can be better in that might help our team be more successful.”

At 2-5, sitting dead-last in the Atlantic Division and in 13th place in the Eastern Conference, the Flyers haven’t been doing much to help out goalie Ilya Bryzgalov. But, as the coach said, Bryz has been very good through the six games he’s played. He has a .924 save percentage and 2.19 goals-against average to show for it.

It’s the rest of the guys on the ice, unfortunately, who have struggled. Friday night in Washington – against one of only a few teams with less wins than them, the Flyers will again try to right the ship.

“I expect two desperate teams tomorrow,” Danny Briere said. “Sometimes they’re a very dangerous team, starting with [Nicklas] Backstrom and [Alex] Ovechkin. It’s not a team you can take lightly. Last year, I think they started the season on a crazy pace and it slowed down, but they’re a team you always have to look out for.”

The Caps have had their own early-season struggles. Go-to goal-scorer Ovechkin has just one marker on the season, and Backstom, too, has had a tough time – the point-a-game player has only three assists in six games so far.

For those reasons, the Flyers expect to meet a hungry, frustrated team in the U.S. capital Friday night.

“They’re going to be desperate like us,” Claude Giroux said. “But we can't figure out them. It’s a long season. We’ve got to figure out the way we play on the ice. We just want to get better. Obviously, the two points are huge. But at the end of the day we can’t be looking at the score. We’ve got to make sure we get better as a team, and we get ready for a full season and not just one game.”

Laviolette shuffled up the Flyers’ lines at Thursday’s practice, hoping to solve the team’s goal-scoring woes.

After the Caps game, the Flyers’ season will be almost 17 percent over. Things haven’t gone the way the team has hoped, but the team is electing to stay positive. It’s not yet time to push the panic button.

“You feel the pressure, obviously,” Briere said. “I’d be lying if I told you we feel good about our 2-5 start. We don’t. But at the same time, I really believe with the team that we have, if we play the way that we’re capable, if we play with the same intensity that we had in the third period against the Rangers, things are going to be fine. That I know.

“But we’ve got to make it happen on the ice. I don’t think it’s time to press any panic button, but it’s time to play a more desperate hockey game.”