It's safe to say Montreal goalie Jose Theodore won't soon forget his first two games against the Flyers this season.

Four goals on 14 shots last night at the First Union Center opened the floodgates to a 6-2 Flyers rout of the Canadiens.

Last week, Theodore gave up four goals to Flyers left winger John LeClair and six overall in a 6-2 loss on home ice.

In Montreal today, Habs fans must be agonizing over how last season's Hart Trophy winner as the league's most valuable player could look so awful in just five starts. Theodore's goals-against average is 4.38.

He also won the Vezina Trophy as the NHL's top goalie last season. Against the Flyers this season, he has given up 10 goals on 38 shots.

Center Michal Handzus burned him for two goals inside the crease. Keith Primeau was more charitable. He had one against Theodore and another against his replacement, Jeff Hackett. Those goals were the big center's first two of the season.

Also of note was Pavel Brendl's two-point night. The winger collected a goal and an assist in a season-high 11 minutes, 20 seconds of ice time.

Defensively, the Flyers gave up a season-low 20 shots. Goalie Roman Cechmanek, who looked strong in Buffalo on Tuesday, seemed shaky on both goals last night, going down quickly and dropping his shoulder. Yet he also made some timely saves.

Ken Hitchcock is impressed with Handzus.

"His strength, his size, his mobility - he can be a 20-minute player for you," the Flyers' coach said. "He really feels like he has a bite [a part] in his team."

Handzus' back-to-back goals early in the second period gave the Flyers a three-goal lead. Both goals were inside the crease, just feet from Theodore.

"You have to go to the net because you cannot score from distance," Handzus said. "We tried to crash in there. We know Theodore is a very good goalie, so we needed traffic in front."

His output wasn't bad for a guy who hasn't had a set line yet because of injuries.

"Everyone has to play together," Handzus said. "You have to get to know each other right away."

Although Hitchcock had talked about opening the game with fire and brimstone, the Flyers were flat in the first period. Montreal trapped them inside their own end, forcing them to make risky passes up the middle of the ice. Early on, Montreal controlled the game.

Are the Flyers just pressing at home in the early going?

"There are other issues going on," Hitchcock said. "There is debris here from expectations, debris from them thinking problems are bigger than they are. Sometimes you get so worried, you forget how to have fun and perform."

Jeremy Roenick explained.

"We're getting caught up trying not to make mistakes in his system, and so we come out tentative and we make mistakes both mentally and physically," the center said. "It's not until the second and third periods we say to ourselves, 'Hey, let's take it to them and have some fun.' When we let ourselves relax and take over the game, it becomes easy."

Take the second-period goal fest. Primeau's first goal at 2 minutes, 26 seconds broke a 1-1 tie. It came via a give-and-go with Justin Williams, who played most of the game on Primeau's line.

Handzus' first goal of the game at 4:29 extended the lead to 3-1. Paul Ranheim, who missed two-thirds of the Flyers' 2-1 loss in Buffalo because of a left quadriceps bruise, came off the right boards and dropped the puck back to Todd Fedoruk. He flicked the puck across the crease off Theodore's stick and it hit Handzus, caroming into the net.

Handzus' magic continued when he scored shorthanded at 6:39 to blow the game open by digging the puck off the back boards and beating Theodore to the near post. Hackett replaced Theodore soon after.

Richard Zednik got one back for Montreal at 13:26 on the power play, muscling a shot through Cechmanek that cut the Canadiens' deficit to 4-2.

"The last 40 minutes, we were strong," Primeau said.

Brendl, who played well, set up the Flyers' first goal 8:59 into the game. He broke down the right side while LeClair, caught in a line change, went to the middle, and Marty Murray cut in from the left for a three-on-one break into the Montreal zone that resulted in Brendl's crossing pass to Murray.

Theodore committed to the near post and was unable to recover as Murray lifted the puck into the upper right corner of the net.

By the end of the first period, Murray had suffered a pulled groin muscle, the second Flyer to be felled by such an injury in seven games. Left winger Radovan Somik, who had such a promising preseason, has been bothered by a groin pull since the end of training camp.

"It's kind of weird," Murray said. "I dropped my stick and bent down to pick it up, and my leg kind of slipped and I felt a little pop. It's a slight strain."

Montreal tied the score at 11 minutes on Saku Koivu's third goal and second this season against the Flyers.

"You're not going to win all the games," Hitchcock said. "But you want to be the team that initiates more than reacts. We're a good hockey club if we get our initiation up a little bit."