A note on discipline
If there’s one bit that we can really zero in on as something of a negative from this game, it would be the volume of penalties the Flyers found themselves taking here. This wasn’t hugely extreme, with three minors taken on the night, but they did feel a little needlessly sloppy, and what’s more, when you’re facing the sixth best power play in the league (even short Nikita Kucherov), ideally you’d like to see them playing a little tighter than that.
And while they did get burned on that first penalty kill, credit to them, the Flyers did well to shut down the Lightning from there. It was something of a bend but don’t break approach, as they didn’t keep the Lightning from creating any looks at all, but between some good work from the skaters to limit the quality of those looks, and a few big stops from Ersson, the Flyers were able to otherwise get the job done. So, while it’s a situation they’d ideally not be in in the first place, credit to the penalty killers for stepping up to keep things from getting out of hand.
Sticking with it
This was a huge win for the Flyers, there’s no doubt about it. To see the losing streak snapped here and now was meaningful, but it felt like it was only a matter of time before it happened. The Flyers played some truly brutal hockey last week, but over the previous couple of games, they took some real steps forward in terms of both their levels of energy and focus, and in shoring up their overall process. Tuesday against the Senators was the best game we’ve seen them play in a while, and the first one where it truly felt like they deserved a better result than what they got, and tonight we saw them build off of that effort, still.
There’s still some work to be done here, and it’s not as though the Flyers didn’t do their fair share to allow the Lightning to stay in this game, but they also managed to do just enough to keep them from pulling away with this one, too. It’s another small step forward, but it’s a step forward all the same. There’s surely a ceiling to what the Flyers can do through the rest of the season with the players they have available to them, but at the very least, they can get themselves back to competing. And compete they did tonight.
The Flyers’ home stand rolls on, and it continued tonight with a big matchup between them and the high-powered Lightning. This ended up a close one, with a shootout to decide it in the end, but the Flyers stepped up in a big way here, and brought enough to come away with the win, and bring their five-game skid to an end.
The Basics
First period: 8:29- Gage Goncalves (Gourde, McDonagh)PPG, 14:20- Bobby Brink (Lycksell, Poehling)
Second period: :15- Zemgus Girgensons (Cernak, Hagel), 10:55- Bobby Brink (Couturier), 19:01- Ryan Poehling (Lycksell, Brink)
Third period: 3:50- Cam Atkinson (Hedman, Moser)
Overtime: No scoring
Shootout: Konecny (no goal), Guentzel (no goal), Mihkov (goal), Point (goal), Brink (no goal), Hedman (no goal), Couturier (no goal), Hagel (no goal), Tippett (goal), Bjorkstrand (no goal)
SOG: 29 (PHI) – 20 (TBL)
Some Takeaways
New looks pay off
The Flyers did a bit of shuffling of their forward lines ahead of this game, and it would appear that the tinkering paid dividends this time around. Particularly the line of Olle Lycksell, Ryan Poehling, and Bobby Brink found some pretty notable and immediate chemistry. They were easily the Flyers’ most dynamic line tonight, buzzing nicely in the offensive zone, and creating good looks on both the cycle and rush alike. All told, it was a productive night for the line, as they combined for two goals (one for Brink, one for Poehling, and with Lycksell getting the primary assist on both), while Brink had a second goal, but this on a shuffled line as he was coming out of the penalty box. There was some pretty tremendous jump shown from this line, and an effective mixing of skill and checking tenacity, and they’ve certainly earned the opportunity to stay together for at least one more game. It’ll be interesting to see if they can keep this rolling into the next game.
Ersson holds steady
The Flyers went back to Sam Ersson for this one, and while the numbers don’t bear out spectacularly for him, it remained a solid showing on the whole for Ersson. He came away with saves on 17 of the 20 shots he faced (good for an .850 save percentage), and this was a hard fought game for him. He may not have faced a high volume of shots, but he was pretty continually having to battle through traffic, and contend against dangerous shots from the Lightning. They brought some real surges — particularly in that overtime frame — and Ersson came up with some huge and timely saves to keep this game within reach for the Flyers. It may not have been perfect, but it was certainly a step in the right direction for him.
The shootout win breaks the Flyers 5 game losing streak.
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