The Philadelphia Flyers ended their string of losses Monday night with a win over the New Jersey Devils. The Flyers welcomed Scott Laughton back into the lineup after he missed the past three games due to a personal family matter.
The team was without Sean Couturier (illness) and Egor Zamula, who is still dealing with his upper body injury. This allowed Erik Johnson to draw back into the lineup. Sam Ersson got the start between the pipes.
Flyers vs Devils recap
Philadelphia came out with a lot of energy to start the contest but was quickly on the penalty kill as Rasmus Ristolainen was served with a double minor for high-sticking Ondrej Palat. The Flyers remain one of the better teams on the penalty kill and survived the four minutes with the one-person disadvantage.
Luckily, Philadelphia could showcase their power play in a more positive light as Devils’ forward Curtis Lazar got sent to the sin bin for a two-minute tripping minor against Scott Laughton. Bobby Brink had a powerful slapshot and gave the Flyers a 1-0 lead and a much-needed power-play goal for the orange and black. Twenty-eight seconds later, Joel Farabee‘s wrist shot went past Devils goalie Jake Allen with an assist from Laughton. The Flyers quickly had a 2-0 lead over the Devils.
In between periods, one of the most electric Zamboni rides took place. Cooper DeJean is NOT a safety; he’s just a Philadelphia Eagle who rides the Zamboni. The Eagles rookie got the crowd fired up, which trickled into the second frame.
Nearly three minutes in, Garnet Hathaway redirected Cam York’s shot on goal and gave the Flyers their most significant lead, 3-0. This was a massive goal for Philadelphia, which has been in a scoring slump lately. The Devils were able to cut the Flyers’ three-goal lead to two as Dougie Hamilton was able to get one past Ersson. The Flyers finished the second fame leading 3-1.
The Flyers and Devils played a solid 18 minutes of the final frame, as both teams were aggressive around each other’s nets. While Ersson and Allen did a great job preventing the pucks from getting past them, the skaters’ blocked shots stole the show.
Timo Meier cut the deficit to one with under two minutes left in regulation. With the Devils pulling Allen out of the net for the extra skater, Laughton capitalized on the empty net, tailing off the scoring, giving the Flyers a 4-2 win over New Jersey.
Ersson had an impressive game, saving 31 shots on goal, which had to be a much-needed confidence boost. However, Matvei Michkov‘s ice time was only nine minutes. This doesn’t come as a surprise, as Tortorella is known to limit ice time if he’s unhappy with how a player is doing. The Flyers practice Tuesday and go down the turnpike to New Jersey for a rematch on Wednesday.
