|
Wrapup: Comeback Flyers Get Pre-Xmas Wish, Down Blues 4-3 |
|
|
|
|
|
WRAPUP: FLYERS GET PRE-CHRISTMAS WISH, DOWN BLUES 4-3
No hockey team can afford to chase games too often if it expects to be successful on a consistent basis. Following a five-night schedule break over Christmas week, the Philadelphia Flyers will need to break out of a cycle that has seen the team get off to slow starts in games.
Nevertheless, the team will gladly take its second straight multi-goal comeback into the break as the Flyers earned a 4-3 victory over the St. Louis Blues after trailing 3-0 midway through regulation and 3-2 after two periods at the Wells Fargo Center on Monday night. Two nights earlier in Columbus, the Flyers pulled off a two-goal comeback in the third period en route to a 3-2 loss via shootout to the Blue Jackets.
A shorthanded goal by Chris VandeVelde at 10:03 of the second period, scored less than a minute after Magnus Pääjärvi scored on a two-man breakaway to open a three-goal lead for St. Louis, proved to be a critical turning point. The Flyers dominated the final 30 minutes of the game and went on to win as Wayne Simmonds netted even strength two-on-one and power play deflection goals before Evgeny Medvedev put the Flyers ahead to stay with 3:13 left in regulation.
Rookie defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere and left winger Jakub Voracek earned the assists on both Simmonds' goals. The first tally started on a counterattack started by Gostisbehere out of the defensive zone, followed by a tape-to-tape feed from Voracek to Simmonds' and a perfect finish by Simmonds on the ensuing two-on-one rush. The game-tying goal deflected off Simmonds leg in front of the net on a shot by Voracek from the right circle.
Robby Fabbri, Kevin Shattenkirk (power play) and Pääjärvi scored for the Blues as St. Louis built its 3-0 lead over the first 29:11 of the game.
Steve Mason had an unremarkable statistical game (26 saves on 29 shots) but had to author numerous outstanding saves to give his club a chance to win. Likewise, St. Louis counterpart Jake Allen (27 saves on 31 shots) played better than his stats for the night suggest.
"There's this belief that if we stick to it, we won't always come back, but we'll give ourselves a chance," Mason said to the attending media. "Tonight, we gave ourselves a chance. Stuck around, made it a one-goal game going into the third period. Hard work took over, and guys were rewarded for a strong second half of the game."
St. Louis dominated the first period, taking a 2-0 lead and 15-8 shot advantage to the first intermission. Loose play in the defensive zone caused the first goal. On what should have been called a penalty on St. Louis in the neutral zone, Brayden Schenn lost the puck as he had his skates knocked out near the boards by Jori Lehterä. Claude Giroux then lost the puck inside the defensive zone with Medvedev caught in no man's land nearby.
The Flyers never recovered on the rest of the play, scrambling around the defensive zone.
Mason denied a Dmitrij Jaskin backhanded attempt near the right post but Jaskin immediately regained the puck and swung around behind the net as Fabbri parked himself in the left slot. Jaskin then threaded a pass between Medvedev's skates and a wide-open Fabbri one-timed the puck home from point blank range before Mason could move over the other way in time.
Fabbri, who scored the game's first goal in the Blues' 4-2 loss to the Flyers on Dec. 10, notched his sixth tally of the season. Jaskin earned the lone assist at 8:16. The Blues continued to press the attack over the middle stages of the period.
Voracek, the only player who got penalized from a multi-player scrum near the benches followed by a high-hit on R.J. Umberger by Colton Parayko, received a roughing minor at 14:03 of the first period. At 14:51, the Blues extended the lead to 2-0.
St. Louis crisply rotated the puck around the offensive zone. Tarasenko threaded the needle cross-ice for Shattenkirk to blast an unstoppable one-timer upstairs from the faceoff dot over Mason before the goalie had a chance to move to his right and cover the angle on the righthanded shooter. Paul Stastny received the secondary assist on the power play goal.
During the first period intermission, Flyers head coach Dave Hakstol reportedly lit into his team in the locker room. Already disgusted with themselves, the players reiterated the wakeup call among themselves.
“I think we didn’t [respond] in the first, that’s why we were all over the place. Sometimes it happens, we came to the locker room and we had a talk about it," Voracek said to the media after the game. "We got to focus on ourselves and we couldn’t change what happened in the first. We went out and everybody stepped up in their game.”
The Flyers played a bit better early in the second period but could not make any headway on the scoreboard. Mason kept the team within two goals early with a spectacular one-on-one glove save on the deadly Tarasenko -- who brought a five-goal goal scoring streak into the game -- at the 1:54 mark and hung on for the stoppage. Allen then made tough stops on Brayden Schenn and VandeVelde off a close-range deflection.
Philly then found itself in even worse position at 9:11 of the middle frame. An ill-advised play by Michael Del Zotto, carrying the puck into the offensive zone up the right side and then giving the puck away on an attempted back pass to an overskating Pierre-Edouard Bellemare created a 2-on-0 breakaway after Stastny passed to Pääjärvi and then followed behind him as a trailer.
The Flyers desperately needed Mason to bail them out again. Instead, Pääjärvi methodically waited for Mason to open up his skates as the attacker moved right from the left circle to inside the hash marks and then threaded a 15-foot wrist shot between the pads before Mason could close up the five-hole. Stastny earned the lone assist on Pääjärvi's second goal of the year.
Just five seconds after the Pääjärvi goal, the Flyers found themselves in even more dire straights when Giroux was whistled off for hooking Pääjärvi. The game was on the brink of getting completely out of reach for the Flyers.
Suddenly, Shattenkirk attempted a neutral zone cross-ice pass and turned it over to Bellemare, who went off on a breakaway. The French forward made a nifty west to east reversal of direction in close, pulling the puck from his forehand to his backhand. Allen made an even better skate save sliding to the right post but could not keep his foot against the iron as the trailing VandeVelde outmuscled Alexander Steen and jammed the puck home to cut the Flyers' deficit to 3-1 at 10:03.
Just like that, the game's momentum turned 180 degrees. The Flyers still had a mountain to climb but instantly went from desperate and lost to energized and focused. The rest of the game more or less belonged to Philly.
"The bench was pretty down getting that penalty," VandeVelde admitted to the attending media in the postgame lockerroom. "But Pierre made a nice play, I followed it up and put it in. That's huge for the team."
At the 12:13 mark of the middle frame, the Flyers cut the gap to one goal. Gostisbehere made a tremendous play in the defensive zone to spring Voracek and Simmonds on a two-on-one counterattack. Simmonds finished off Voracek's cross-ice feed with a perfectly executed snap shot from 14 feet over Allen. The goal had no chance at making a save.
With 30 seconds left in the second period, the Flyers received their first power play since the opening minute of the game, as Lehterä was sent off for high-sticking Giroux. The Flyers did not score in the remaining time but took 1:30 worth of carryover 5-on-4 time into the third period. Shots in the second period were 14-9 in the Flyers' favor.
At the 51-second mark of the third period, the Flyers drew even in the game at 3-3. Net front power play forward Simmonds, who entered the game with seven road goals but none at home, notched his second tally of the game as he re-directed Voracek's right side shot past Allen. Voracek's assist was his team-leading 20th while Gostisbehere picked up his eighth helper since his recall from the American Hockey League.
After the Flyers heavily pushed the pace and St. Louis struggled to keep up over the latter half of the second period, Philly continued to bottle up the Blues, outshooting Ken Hitchcock's club by a 9-5 margin in the process. Mason's toughest stop on the third period came at 12:44 as he tracked the puck well and denied a Lehterä deflection from just 12 feet from the net.
The Flyers topped off their comeback at the 16:47 mark. Ryan White deflected a Giroux shot wide of the net. The puck was retrieved on the left half boards by VandeVelde, who made a pass to White in the left circle. White then moved to his right across the slot then sent a backhanded pass through Jaskin to a pinching Medvedev. From the right slot, the Russian defenseman then beat the goalie with a 28-foot wrist shot from inside the hash mark with VandeVelde going to the net.
Medvedev's goal was his second in the NHL. He attempted five shot on the night in 22:14 of ice time, putting two on the net and the game-winner in back of the net.
The Blues pulled Allen for an extra attacker but the Flyers did a good job at putting down the defensive clamps. Mason saw just one shot the rest of the way.
Giroux won a crucial defensive zone draw against David Backes after a Philadelphia icing and a timeout called by head coach Dave Hakstol. With 1:09 left, Medvedev took the puck away from a St. Louis attacker and cleared the zone. The Blues went offside with 1:01 left and Sean Couturier beat Backes on the ensuing neutral zone faceoff. Finally, Mason turned away a harmless desperation neutral zone slapper by Steen and time expired.
“We didn’t want to go into the break on a losing note and we thought that we’ve been playing really well and good hockey as of late and I thought it was only right for us to go into the break with a win. We channeled our inner strength and we got the win, the two points, it was big for us," Simmonds said.
POSTGAME NOTES
* Final shot attempts were 63-55 in the Flyers' favor. In addition to their 31 shots on goal, the Flyers had 20 shot attempts blocked and missed the net 12 times. The Blues got blocked 15 times and missed the net 11 times in addition to the 29 that were put on net.
* Last season, the Flyers took a 6-1-3 run and 14-14-6 (34 points) overall record through 34 games into the Christmas schedule break. One year later, Philadelphia is 15-12-7 (37 points) through 34 games and takes a 10-4-4 run over its last 18 games.
* The Flyers will take a complete off-day on Dec. 23. The team has a five-night schedule break over Christmas that will end when they begin a three-game California road trip with a Dec. 27 match against the Anaheim Ducks.
* On Wednesday's blog, there will be a Flyers-related World Junior Championship preview.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
Join the Discussion:
»