Game 1, 8:00 P.M.: Flyers Visit Blackhawks To Kick Off Stanley Cup Final

Preview courtesy of Sports Network. For more on tonight's game, check out our preview, which ran yesterday, and our blogs: Second City Hockey, covering the Blackhawks, and Broad Street Hockey, covering the Flyers.

CHICAGO -- The Stanley Cup Finals will get underway tonight in Chicago, when the Blackhawks host the surprising Philadelphia Flyers in Game 1 from United Center.

This best-of-seven series features a pair of franchises attempting to end long Stanley Cup dry spells. Chicago hasn't won it all since 1961, giving the Blackhawks the NHL's longest current championship drought. The Flyers' last title was in the spring of 1975, when the Broad Street Bullies won the second of back-to-back Cups.

Both clubs are 0-5 in the Stanley Cup Finals since their last championships and they were also both swept the last time they reached this stage. Chicago lost in four to Pittsburgh in 1992 and the Flyers were swept by Detroit in 1997.

The Blackhawks, who will also host Game 2 on Monday, are 5-3 as the host in the playoffs after going 29-8-4 in the Windy City during the regular season. Philadelphia had a sub-par 17-21-3 road mark this year, but has posted a 5-4 record as the road team in the postseason

Chicago, the second-seeded team from the Western Conference, entered this postseason as Central Division champions and the Hawks have shown in the postseason whey they've been a Cup favorite all year long. The Blackhawks beat both Nashville and Vancouver in six games during the first and second rounds, respectively, and then swept top-seeded San Jose for the conference title.

On the other hand, the Flyers are the seventh-seeded club from the East and needed to beat the New York Rangers in a shootout on the final day of the regular season to even qualify for the playoffs.

Philadelphia began this postseason with a five-game series victory over New Jersey before pulling off a historic comeback in Round 2. The Flyers lost the first three games to Boston in the conference semifinals before becoming just the third team in NHL history to rally from a three-games-to-none deficit to win a series. The Flyers were then able to eliminate Montreal in five games to claim the Eastern Conference title.

Both the Blackhawks and Flyers have been led on offense this postseason by their young captains. Chicago captain Jonathan Toews, 22, is first in the NHL with 26 points (7 goals, 19 assists) in these playoffs, while 25-year-old Mike Richards is second in the league with 21 points (6g, 15a) to pace the Flyers.

Toews and Richards also helped Team Canada win a gold medal a few months back at the Vancouver Olympics and the duo even skated on the same line at the Winter Games. The captains are also friendly off the ice, but obviously the goodwill between Richards and Toews will be put on hold for the duration of this series.

"He understands and I understand it's going to be competitive out there, and we're probably going to play each other tough," said Richards.

It's not all Richards and Toews in this series, however. The Flyers and Blackhawks have received balanced scoring in these playoffs with each club boasting 11 players that have scored two or more goals in this postseason.

On the defensive end, Chris Pronger is the big gun for Philly and Duncan Keith leads the way on the Chicago blueline. Pronger, a former Hart and Norris Trophy winner, is pacing all NHL defensemen with 14 points (4g, 10a) in this postseason. Keith, a finalist for this year's Norris, has 10 points on one goal and nine assists.

Both clubs have received excellent goaltending in this postseason, but neither team's netminder was battle-tested coming into the playoffs.

Chicago's backstop, the 26-year-old Antti Niemi, had seen action in just three NHL games prior to the start of the 2009-10 campaign, but he won the starting job from Cristobal Huet during the regular season and has been superb so far in the postseason. Niemi, who was about two weeks too old to be considered a rookie this year, is 12-4 with a 2.33 goals-against average and a .921 save percentage in the tournament.

Niemi also comes into this series on a high note, having yielded a total of eight goals over his last five games.

Meanwhile, Philadelphia's netminder, Michael Leighton, has gone from journeyman to savior in the course of a few months. With starter Ray Emery injured in December, the Flyers picked up Leighton from Carolina on waivers and he outplayed Brian Boucher to take over the No. 1 job in a hurry.

Leighton wound up with a 16-5-2 record and a 2.48 GAA in 27 regular-season games with the Flyers before suffering a high ankle injury in March. The injury also caused him to miss nine playoff games, but when Boucher was hurt in Game 5 against Boston it was recently-healed Leighton's time to shine once again.

Leighton has been nothing short of amazing so far in the postseason, going 6-1 with a 1.45 GAA and .948 save percentage. He also set a Flyers club record with three shutouts in one series, pulling off the feat in the last round against Montreal.

Now, Leighton has a chance to beat one of his former teams in Chicago, which selected him in the sixth round of the 1999 draft.

"We've faced some great goalies already," said Chicago general manager Stan Bowman of the Blackhawks' former property. "Michael is on a hot streak here. He's not going to be any easier than they've been. If we keep playing our game, hopefully we can get around that."

Boucher is expected to be back in uniform for Game 1 of this series, serving as the back-up to Leighton.

In terms of coaching, Flyers bench boss Peter Laviolette is trying to win his second Stanley Cup title, having led Carolina to a championship in 2006. Chicago's Joel Quenneville has made it to his first Cup Finals as a head coach, but he was an assistant on Colorado's 1996 championship team.

The Flyers and Blackhawks faced each other just once this season, but it was a very exciting battle and could give us some clues as to how this series will unfold.

Philly pulled out a 3-2 home victory over the 'Hawks on March 13 and all five goals came in the third period. Chicago appeared headed to a victory after taking a 2-1 lead with just over seven minutes left, but Scott Hartnell tied the game with 2:04 remaining and Pronger scored the game-winner with just 2.1 ticks left on the clock.

Huet was the goaltender for Chicago in the March meeting and Niemi has never faced the Flyers. Leighton's only career game against the team that drafted him was in this year's tilt between Philly and the 'Hawks.

The only playoff meeting between Chicago and Philadelphia was in the 1971 quarterfinals, a series that was swept by the Blackhawks.