Quick Hits: Flyers Take Rangers to Shootout, Lose 3-2
It never feels good to come away with two points from a game that your team led after the first period and went into the third period tied. However, the Flyers' 3-2 shootout loss to the New York Rangers at the Wells Fargo Center on Thursday night was a decent effort and a tolerable outcome under the circumstances.
The Flyers had seven players out due to being on the COVID-19 protocol; a situation that will carry over to Sunday's outdoor game against the Bruins in Lake Tahoe. Additionally, the Flyers are coming off a 10-day schedule break caused by four successive game postponements. They only had one bonafide practice plus a morning skate. Four Taxi Squad players (Samuel Morin, David Kase, Andy Andreoff and Maksim Sushko in his NHL debut) were pressed into service. Fourth-line wingers Michael Raffl and Nicolas Aube-Kubel, who put forth strong efforts, were pressed into second-line duty and fourth-line center Connor Bunnaman played third-line left wing.
The Flyers got goals from Aube-Kubel (2nd of the season) and Joel Farabee (7th) in regulation. They got two assists from Kevin Hayes and one apiece from Raffl and Sean Couturier. Couturier played an effective overall game, looking like he's back to full strength after missing 10 games with a rib injury and returning for the team's last non-postponed game in Washington.
Apart from one rebound he'd like back -- as part of a sequence that started with a failed defensive zone exit chance and ended with the deadly Artemi Panarin making a picturesque setup pass to Brendan Smith for a slam dunk -- Carter Hart was strong. He stopped 31 of 33 shots overall in regulation and OT including a Pavel Buchnevich breakaway and subsequent penalty shot (the latter of which should not have been awarded based on the quality of the scoring opportunity on the first).
The Flyers were outshot overall, 33 to 22, but unlike many of the games where Philadelphia has been outshot by a wide margin this season, it was not really due to a negative puck possession disparity (except in the second period). The Rangers blocked 27 Philadelphia shot attempts in this game, and Philly also missed the net on 11 attempts.
New York got regulation goals from Colin Blackwood (power play, 3rd) on a high-tip that Hart had little chance to stop and a third-period go-ahead goal by Smith (1st). The Flyers survived a 5-on-3 (mostly 4-on-3) penalty kill in the fiirst period and a two-minute 4-on-3 in overtime to get the game to a shootout. The Flyers' power play went 0-for-5.
Alexasandar Georgiev stopped 20 of 22 Flyers shots. Both Philadelphia goals came in scrambles around the net. Along the way, he stopped a Farabee one-timer on a 2-on-1, made a spectacular pad save on Raffl on a successful set play for the Flyers, and also denied Hayes from the slot among his 20 saves.
In the skills competition, only Couturier, attacking full steam and going forehand-backhand-forehand to outmaneuver Georgiev and score, converted his attempt among the three Philadelphia shooters. Neither Hayes nor James van Riemsdyk scored on their attempts. Meanwhile, the highly skilled Kaapo Kakko and even more skilled Artemi Panarin made their attempts look almost easy for them.
Ivan Provorov led the Flyers with 27:38 of ice time and Travis Sanheim skated 23:54. With the Flyers' depth so depleted, not only did Couturier log 23:39 and Hayes play 22:05, the Flyers also called upon JVR (21:46), Farabee (21:18), Raffl (20:33) and Shayne Gostisbehere (22:35) to play expanded minutes.
For an in-depth recap, analysis, stats and highlights of Thursday's game, see the
Postgame 5 on the Flyers' official website. The Flyers depart for Lake Tahoe early in the afternoon on Friday. They'll have a Saturday morning practice there before playing on Sunday.
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
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