The Flyers stopped the bleeding, for a night at least.
They needed the shootout, Matvei Michkov and Owen Tippett to score clean in it, and for Sam Ersson to stand strong for long enough, but they held it together.
The Flyers beat the Tampa Bay Lightning, 4-3, Thursday night at the Wells Fargo Center, snapping a five-game losing streak on what’s been a nightmare of a seven-game homestand.
Bobby Brink counterbalanced two penalties with two goals, and Ryan Poehling slipped to the front of the net unnoticed on a rush to dish out a nasty deke and the tally that gave the Flyers the lead heading into the third period, but they couldn’t hold on to it.
Cam Atkinson, in his return to Philadelphia and first game in the Tampa Bay lineup since March 4, got left alone at the top of the faceoff circles to beat Ersson with a pinpoint shot to the top corner for the 3-3 tie, which kept into overtime and then the shootout through a fair share of scary looks and bounces.
Ersson, after a stretch of shaky performances over his last several starts, looked sharper on Thursday night, and the Flyers defensively buckled down in front of him to suppress the shots on goal against to just 20 from the Lightning.
Still, Gage Goncalves tucked one in on a Yanni Gourde pass from the dot to the far post that cleared through everyone on the Flyers’ penalty kill for a 1-0 Tampa lead past the midway point of the first and then Zemgus Girgensons pushed through contact in front to take in a bounce and slip a fortunate turn through Ersson’s five-hole early in the second.
It took both of Brink’s goals – the first on a well-connected transition up the ice to him from linemates Poehling and Olle Lycksell, and then a pass from Sean Couturier away from the defensive zone half wall that sprung him up the ice and to the net alone – to bring the Flyers back from each, and in the end, what felt like a herculean effort for a sorely needed sigh of relief.
But they pulled through.
They stopped the bleeding, for a night at least.
“You hope it helps their confidence, and it will,” head coach John Tortorella said postgame. “I know we’ve lost the last couple, but we’ve certainly played better the last couple coming into tonight’s game.
“We end up some scoring some goals. Got a couple of saves when we needed them, so yeah, hopefully…they know the situation, and that’s what I appreciate. I don’t think there’s going to be ever a problem on how hard they’re gonna play, but it’s hard for them, so I’m happy they can enjoy it.”
A few other thoughts…
Power(less) play
The Flyers’ power play on the homestand after Thursday night: 0-for-15.
They entered the night as the 30th-ranked unit in the league (15 percent), which, look, it isn’t last, but still not great.
They were dead last in 32nd last year (12.2 percent) and in 2022-23 as well (15.6 percent).
You can chalk it up to a lack of skill, a lack of flow, and maybe a call for a change in structure, too.
But, boy, is the Flyers’ consistent lack of punch on man advantages for going on three years now only becoming a tougher and tougher look for Rocky Thompson.
No way, TK
Travis Konecny’s goal-less drought extended to 10 games, and in the shootout, as the first to go, he beat Lightning goaltender Jonas Johansson, but rang the shot off of both posts and out.
Tortorella moved Konecny up to the top line with Noah Cates and Tyson Foerster to try and get him going again, slipping Brink down to the third line with Lycksell and Poehling to make it work.
Brink ended up scoring two goals.
Konecny’s still in a funk.
Snake-bitten feels like an understatement right now.
The long (long) way to the top
Everyone knows the reality of the situation at this point.
Danny Brière sold at the deadline, and while the Flyers were still technically in the playoff hunt when it passed last Friday, back-to-back deflating losses over the weekend that snowballed into five straight on a seven-game homestand painted exactly where things are going.
They’re not making the playoffs. It’ll be five years since they have, and the team has been skating this past week and will continue to for the last 13 games knowing their fate for this season is sealed, all while most of the teams they’ve been facing – Winnipeg, Calgary, New Jersey, Ottawa, Tampa and Carolina up next – are trying to ramp up for greater.
It’s been a brutal reminder that what the Flyers are undergoing is still very much a rebuild, and that the team still has a long, long way to go.
And there have been signs of progress. They’re trying to get more skilled, and the team is getting younger. But the veterans who have been here and will still be for the long haul, they’re not, and the losing, regardless of age or talent…
“It sucks,” Tortorella said at Thursday’s morning skate in Voorhess. “But we just have to keep our eye on the ball. I have to stay patient as far as some of the things that we’re gonna probably go through here in the last quarter of the year, evaluate as you guys are asking about, but also try to win.
“I’m still going to teach. There are going to be certain situations that there’s gonna be accountability brought in. Every day, there’s accountability. I’m still going to go about it that way…It’s hard, though…Those are the guys that it’s hard for. They’re seeing teams ramping up, and that’s the greatest time of the year. It’s difficult for them to watch.”
But they just have to play on until the end.
The pieces are lining up for the Flyers to get better. Matvei Michkov arriving ahead of schedule, putting up 20 goals in Year 1, and making a run after the Calder Trohpy (whether he wins it or not) is huge; the team is stacked with draft capital for the next several years; they’re lining up to finally get some breathing room with the salary cap thanks to a league-wide increase and some of their own money coming off the books; and the front office finally felt comfortable enough to trade a longtime leader in Scott Laughton and leave the locker room to the next core pieces in Foerster, Cates, Brink and carry-overs Travis Sanheim, Konecny, and Couturier.
Yet this team, if it is going to eventually become a contender, is way far from complete, and filling all the holes, again, that’s going to take a while.
But that’s the reality of the situation, and everyone knows it – even if the pill is no less tougher to swallow.
“They’ve done their work,” Tortorella said. “They’ve pushed, I think guys have developed, they’ve hung together, they’ve stuck together…This is the first time, at least in the last two years, that it’s a tough hill to climb, right? So I feel for them, and I feel for my coaching staff, Danny Brière, the whole organization. I mean, we want to get to where we want to be…What happened at the deadline, with all the players going prior with [Joel Farabee] and [Morgan Frost], I think it was the right thing. The deadline was a seller’s market. I thought Danny did some great things there. But then we, you know, we’re here.
So they just have to play on.
“I don’t expect anything less as ar as the effort from the guys,” Tortorella said. “That’s all we can hang our hat on, is to play as hard as we can, try to find a way to win some games, try to have some fun, and then we’ll see where we go with the process.”
It’s still going to be a long one.
Follow Nick on Twitter: @itssnick
Follow Nick on Bluesky: @itssnick
Like us on Facebook: PhillyVoice Sports
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
