Ersson has been playing very well over the last few months, but in his last two starts, he first gave up five goals on 25 shots, allowing the Penguins to erase a 3-0 deficit, and was pulled less than half a period into Tuesday’s game.
Not ideal.
Cates keeps it up
This loss didn’t come without a couple silver linings, and the continued strong play of Noah Cates is certainly one of them. Cates logged his career-high 14th goal of the season seconds after Ersson was replaced by Fedotov in net, briefly shifting momentum in the Flyers’ favor.
Cates has now logged points in four straight games after being held off the scoresheet for 11 consecutive outings.
His line also thrived from a play-driving perspective. Cates, flanked by Bobby Brink and Tyson Foerster, finished the night with a 71.43 Corsi For percentage and 77.57 Expected Goals For percentage at 5-on-5. Head coach John Tortorella ended up shuffling lines throughout the game, but he didn’t dare tinker with the Cates line, which totaled 11:28 of 5-on-5 ice time.
Michkov back on the scoresheet
While the Flyers were playing, San Jose Sharks rookie Macklin Celebrini scored his 19th goal of the season to tie Matvei Michkov for the lead in rookie goal scoring. Michkov must have somehow been keeping track on the bench, because he quickly netted a marker of his own to reach the 20-goal mark.
Or so we thought.
The goal was initially credited to Michkov, but the NHL ruled after the game that captain Sean Couturier touched the bouncing puck just before it crossed the goal line.
Regardless, Michkov now has 45 points on the season, which is the fourth-most by a Flyers rookie since 2000. And he still has 20 games to add to that total.
This kid sure is something.
Coming off arguably their most impressive win of the season, the Philadelphia Flyers returned to Wells Fargo Center Tuesday night with hopes of closing the four-point gap separating them from a playoff spot. But against the Calgary Flames — and a pair of familiar faces — the Flyers suffered a demoralizing 6-3 loss less than three days ahead of the fast-approaching trade deadline.
The Basics
First period: 7:40 — Zary (Pachal, Huberdeau), 8:13 — Kadri (Hanley), 9:32 — Zary (Lomberg, Rooney), 9:54 — Cates (Foerster, Brink), 17:11 — Kuzmenko (unassisted), 17:29 — Sharangovich (Pospisil, Frost)
Second period: 16:33 — Weegar (Frost, Huberdeau)
Third period: 10:43 — Michkov (Kuzmenko, Sanheim), 18:59 — Coronato (Kadri, Weegar)
SOG: 33 (CGY) – 27 (PHI)
Takeaways
The revenge game
The top storyline ahead of puck drop was the return of Joel Farabee and Morgan Frost. On January 30, the Flyers traded the duo to Calgary in exchange for Andrei Kuzmenko, Jakob Pelletier and a pair of draft picks. The trade caught fans off guard, especially due to its timing. The trade deadline was still over a month away, and there wasn’t much public chatter surrounding Farabee and Frost as imminent trade candidates. But there’s a whole lot that happens behind closed doors that fans — and even the press — don’t hear about.
Farabee and Frost haven’t been all that productive since joining the Flames. The duo has combined for just four total points in 10 games since being traded. Did their luck change when taking on their former team? For Farabee, not so much. He was held without a point for the eighth straight game. Frost, meanwhile, had himself a solid outing, logging a pair of assists and 16:22 of ice time.
This wasn’t just a revenge game for Farabee and Frost, though. Kuzmenko and Pelletier also came in with a little extra intensity after they were shipped out of Calgary. Pelletier was held off the scoresheet, but Kuzmenko logged an assist and found twine with a laser that whistled right by the glove of Flames netminder Dustin Wolf in the first period to momentarily shrink the deficit to 3-2.
Ersson struggles again
Sam Ersson was given the night off Saturday after a rough outing against the Pittsburgh Penguins last week. With the added rest, one would expect Ersson to enter Tuesday night’s tilt refreshed and primed for a strong performance.
That didn’t happen. Ersson allowed three goals on just five shots, all scored within a span of just 1:52.
He had no chance on the first goal. Connor Zary pulled off a perfect redirection in the low slot that few goalies would have been able to stop. But the next two were inexcusable. Less than a minute after the icebreaker, Nazem Kadri zipped a wrister right past Ersson, who didn’t appear prepared for the shot. Soon after, Zary scored his second goal of the night with an angle shot that banked in off of Ersson’s shoulder.
Before the first period even hit its midway point, Ersson was pulled from the game and replaced by backup Ivan Fedotov, who was a star in the Flyers’ victory over the Winnipeg Jets on Saturday. But at that point, the damage was already done. The early 3-0 hole proved too back-breaking to overcome.
Flyers goalie Samuel Ersson struggled against the Flames giving up 3 goals in less than 2 minutes before being pulled in favor of Ivan Fedotov, who game up another 3 goals.
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