The cushion is still there. The breaths are not desperate gasps – yet. There is still enough time and space to operate with a little wiggle and be OK.

I’ve been saying it all along; the Flyers created some much needed padding with that 12-game point streak against inferior competition, because the gauntlet was coming.

And three swipes of that blade by some southern executioners from Raleigh, Tampa and the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale area each drew some blood.

Yes, the brutal part of the Flyers schedule has begun, and it has not yielded pretty results. In three games against two teams scratching and clawing to make the playoffs (Carolina and Florida) and one against the best team in the sport (Tampa Bay) the Flyers are 0-2-1.

They have allowed 15 goals in those three games. The mistakes are mounting. So are the injuries. Once again, the Flyers are starting to seem fragile, like they were in November, and not super confident, like they’ve been the past couple months.

It could be just a bad stretch. After all, they took the Lightning to the brink. Although Tampa was obviously the better team, you have to give the Flyers credit for punching and counter-punching the better team, even if they blew two-goal leads twice in the same game.

So, maybe this isn’t a big deal.  After all, the Flyers are still in second place in the Metropolitan Division, just two points behind first place Washington.

But the division and the playoff race has slowly started to squeeze in in them.

Pittsburgh is just one point back of the Flyers. The Devils are five back. Columbus, six. The red-hot Panthers, who squashed the Flyers 4-1 yesterday but are still one-point out of a playoff spot, are nine points back, which is a lot, until you realize Florida has three games in hand and the easiest schedule remaining in the Eastern Conference based on the records of their remaining opponents.

And don’t forget Carolina, who is just two points out a playoff spot. They show up twice more on the calendar for Philadelphia.

The next four games for the Flyers are against teams who are ahead of them in the standings. And then three more Metropolitan teams all in the thick of the playoff race before a two-game “respite” against Detroit and the New York Rangers. Frankly, 12 of the remaining 16 games this season are against teams firmly in the playoffs or fighting for a spot.

So, who knows what Petr Mrazek’s homecoming will look like in Detroit? What shape will this Flyers team be in by then? Will they have rebounded and be fighting for home ice advantage in the first round, maybe even the division title?

Or will they have slipped and be among the gang of five fighting for the final two wild card spots?

The next two weeks are, in essence, the Flyers season. It’s a playoff of sorts. A seven-game stretch of games against opponents who can’t afford to take a night off.

The magic number is seven. Average a point a game, and the Flyers should be fine. More than that, and we’ll be talking about a division title when Mrazek returns to Detroit.

Less than that, and it’ll be nail-biting time over the final nine games of the season.

What do I think?

You won’t need your nail clippers any time soon.

I know that sounds defeatist – and I understand this may sound like an overreaction after just three subpar games. And call me fair-weather if you want – I extole their virtues when they’re winning and magnify their warts when they’re losing.

It’s fair. I get i it.

But, I’m always honest.

And during that 12-game streak, I repeatedly called them charmed. Lucky. Opportunistic.

That’s because even though they were winning, I was seeing things that made me say, “How the hell is this team winning?”

It’s hard to explain it. It’s hard to understand it. Even the guys who like to flash fancy stats around have avoided discussing the Flyers at length because they don’t make sense to them either.

I will give the Flyers this: They are a relentless team. They don’t stop. They keep coming at you. Even down 4-0 yesterday to Florida, you get a play like this:

There was a little more than three minutes left. Konecny doesn’t have to go to the dirty areas and risk getting hacked, or cross-checked (which he was).

But he did. Because these guys don’t know any other way. And that’s a credit to the team.

But this is also a team that really lacks depth. It has one very good scoring line. A second pretty good scoring line and a strong, but still young, top defensive pair.

After that… meh.

And as much as you’d like to play those guys, it’s just not realistic to have your eight best players on the ice for more than half the game.

And there’s the rub for the Flyers. Their depth is killing them.

Hakstol tried his fourth line against Carolina’s top line last week. Failure.

Brandon Manning and Radko Gudas as a pair. On most nights. Failure.

Mrazek these past three games after three great games. Failure.

Breakouts and zone clears? Consistently a failure.

Johnny Oduya, playing in his first game for the Flyers, gets hurt, but before that? Failure.

Yeah, Oduya played yesterday. It wasn’t pretty. He looked old. He looked like he was uncertain. He was playing a lot of minutes too, in place of Andrew MacDonald, who has an upper body injury (and that isn’t bogus. He got hurt against Carolina and played through it against Tampa).

To be fair to Oduya, he hadn’t really had time to practice with the team because of a work visa issue, but still, the guy’s a pro. He’s been in the league a long time. He should be able to pick  up what’s been asked to do quickly.

And now he’s hurt too.

Travis Sanheim? Maybe. Possibly. If both MacDonald and Oduya don’t recover by Wednesday.

And while this will send Flyers fans into a euphoric state, I offer you this as a reminder of young players this time of year.

Taylor Leier was benched for the remainder of the game after his pass into the middle of the ice as the Flyers entered the Florida zone quickly went the other way and became the goal that made it 3-0 Panthers.

When you hear us old heads constantly say “you gotta get the puck in deep,” that’s why. Passes like this are high risk and often low reward.

In hockey, it’s almost always better to make the lower risk play.

At this time of year, with the team where it is in the standings, and these games having so much more meaning, are you willing to trade off success to have younger guys play more regularly?

I can almost guarantee you Leier doesn’t play against Pittsburgh Wednesday.

That’s not to say Sanheim would come up and be a turnover machine. He might not. He might step in and play well. But, he may also make that mistake of youth – a play you can get away with in junior hockey, or maybe even the AHL, that is instinctual and part of your repertoire, can easily be blown up at the NHL level.

Now, far be it from me to suggest that the veterans don’t know what the hell they’re doing sometimes either.

I mean, I give you Jori Lehtera after he scored against Tampa. He now has only two more goals than me this season:

As for Mrazek, I’m really starting to not like his game in goal. He sits way too far back in the net. He’s quick and moves laterally really well, but where he positions himself leaves him prone to giving up rebounds into the “high-danger area” or even face a lot of shots from awkward angles that could result in crazy goals.

I’m not sure that’s even fixable, to be honest. It’s just the way he plays goalie. Again, there are times you can get away with that, but good teams will eat you up when you play like that – and the fact that he’s allowed 14 goals in his last three starts after allowing just four in his first three starts as a Flyer might mean the league is on to something with him.

That wouldn’t be good if that were the case.

Brian Elliott can’t get healthy soon enough. And to be honest, I would never have predicted I would have ever written those words in that order at the beginning of the season.

So, next up is the Penguins on Rivalry Night for national television, Wednesday at 8 p.m. The Penguins often bring out the Flyers’ best focus, although in two games against Pittsburgh this year, the Flyers looked overmatched.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Wayne Simmonds is back in the lineup (replacing Leier) and I’ll predict MacDonald is back in the lineup too.

But if things continue down this path of inconsistent and uneven play, and the losing streak becomes four games before heading to Boston, I’d say yep, it’s white knuckle time, folks.