The Flyers scored four goals in one period, but still nearly blew the lead in a 6-4 win over the New York Islanders on Thursday night.

It was a feisty one as well, with some good fights, including this one:

Ivan Provorov scored two goals and one assist in the winning effort for the Flyers while Sean Couturier had one goal and an assist of his own.

However, the best part of the night may have taken place in the concourse as CB staffer Chris Jastrzembski ran into the legend.

https://twitter.com/CFJastrzembski/status/949097150054649856

The Roundup:

The NFL’s ratings were down this season.

Kyle made a controversial cheesesteak pick, got grilled for it. His defense:

Many locals turn their bulbous noses up at Pat’s and Geno’s, and perhaps now even Tony Luke’s, because they’re the popular tourist spots shown on TV ostensibly bastardizing whatever hyper-local version of the cheesesteak assholes deem is correct. But the sandwiches served up by these establishments are the canonical version of whatever it means to be a “Philly cheesesteak,” and they’re damn good. In my opinion, Pat’s is the best of the bunch.

Serena Williams withdrew from the Australian Open.

According to WPXI, Ryan Shazier regained feeling in his legs.

Kevin Kinkead asks if the novelty of the Winter Classic wore off?

Remember when you first saw your favorite band?

Everything was new and exciting. You heard songs like “Nightrain” in a live setting, drank crappy beer in a parking lot, and crossed one off the bucket list.

Then you saw that band for a second time. It was cool, but the setlist was mostly the same. They added a few tracks here and there, and maybe the venue was different, but it was never going to be better than the first gig.

This could be interesting:

President Trump is reportedly planning to attend the College Football National Championship on Monday.

Southern Miss and Stony Brook are canceling a scheduled baseball series due to an anti-gay marriage law.

The Spurs sat several key players, and the Sixers took advantage for a win on Wednesday night. Kinkead has his observations, including this:

It wasn’t just Simmons’ getting to the line, it was the free throw disparity in general that put the Sixers over the top last night.

They were only averaging 23 per game coming into this one, but finished 33-43 for a 76.7% clip. That doesn’t sound great, but it’s actually higher than their 27th-ranked 75.2% season average. They were only making 17.3 of their attempts per game, so they actually had a +15.7 raw point swing in free throw shooting last night, which, I think, was the key to the win.

They also only committed 21 personal fouls, which is down from their 30th-ranked 23.9 per game.

And the Sixers only turned the ball over 13 times, which is 5.1 fewer than their season average of 18.1

When you make improvements in the three categories that haunt you the most, you start to win these types of close contests.

Sticking with the Sixers, here are the updated All-Star voting results:

Want Eagles playoff tickets? You’ll have to look in the secondary market, as they sold out in one minute.

Ruben Amaro Jr. was on The Goldbergs on Wednesday night.

Mike Jensen was honored for his “A Year in Philly Hoops” series.

In non-sports news…

Iguanas are freezing and falling from trees in Florida.

North Korea accidentally shot a missile at itself.

Yesterday was a Snow Day and today is probably the same. Enjoy!