The power of sports to bond generations

It is one of the glories of sports.

The passion that is handed down from fathers to sons.

I wrote about that in my Monday print column.

Yesterday several readers reached out to share similar feelings.

One told me he also thought of his dad as the Super Bowl ended. He lost him to pancreatic cancer in 2002.

"Maybe he watched the game from heaven," he wrote me.

I don't doubt it for a second.

A few minutes after the Super Bowl ended, I fielded a phone call that only confirmed my belief in the bonding power of sports. It was from my son, who now lives outside Washington, D.C.

He was beside himself.

Yes, sports does that to us.

It just might be what I love most about it.

So how 'bout those Flyers!

They beat the Canadiens in a shootout, 1-0, getting a shutout from newly acquired goaltender Petr Mrazek.

The win vaulted them into first place in the Metropolitan Division. They have now won six straight and have not lost since the Eagles posted that Super Bowl victory.

Perhaps the most loyal fans in sports, those who live and die with the orange and black, have been waiting almost as long as Eagles fans for another Stanley Cup. The Flyers won back-to-back Cups with the Broad Street Bullies back in the '73-'74 and '74-'76 seasons, and have not won since.

Maybe this is the year they come out of the blue to win a Cup.

Stranger things have happened.

We just witnessed it with the Eagles.

I think dad would understand.

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