The Philadelphia Flyers finished off a three-game road trip by taking on the New Jersey Devils at the Prudential Center.
Needing a win following back-to-back losses against the New York Islanders and Pittsburgh Penguins, the Philadelphia Flyers took on the New Jersey Devils on the road and not at home because locations are hard, in their second meeting of the 2019-20 season. The Flyers were able to take the first matchup over their Metropolitan Division adversary, shutting the Devils out 4-0 to earn their second win of the year. Philadelphia will obviously look to do more of the same this time around and put this two-game losing streak behind them. Carter Hart received the start from Head Coach Alain Vigneault, opposing MacKenzie Blackwood between the pipes and, like the entire Flyers team, hoped to turn things around after a couple of recent poor outings.
Philadelphia, once again, didn’t get off to the best of starts, surrendering the game’s first goal less than halfway through the opening stanza. Would you like to guess as to who scored it? Yep, you guessed it, Wayne Simmonds scored his first goal of the year on the power-play to give New Jersey a 1-0 lead because former Flyers always get the last laugh. The Flyers had killed off 16 straight penalties prior to Simmer’s tally, showing that all good things must come to an end at some point.
That early-period lead wouldn’t last long, though, as Oskar Lindblom scored his team-high seventh goal of the season to tie the game at one. The second-line combination of Lindblom, Sean Couturier, and Travis Konecny was at it again, showcasing a beautiful passing display on a rush into the offensive zone that led to the Swedish forward roofing a shot by Blackwood and knotting everything up heading into the second.
The Lindblom-Couturier-Konecny kept doing the thing in the second, generating the Flyers’ second goal of the evening to put their side up by one. Lindblom set up a Couturier slap-shot that snuck its’ way through Blackwood and into the back of the net for the centerman’s third goal of 2019-20, giving each of the forwards two points on the night. Sami Vatanen would go on to pot New Jersey’s second power-play goal of the contest later on in the frame and make it a 2-2 affair after 40 minutes of work.
The teams traded chances through the early half of the third, eventually leading to Taylor Hall scoring a strange goal to gift New Jersey with a 3-2 lead. The Devils Captain blasted by Justin Braun while skating into the Flyers zone and Braun, for some odd reason, decided to hit Hall into Hart, causing the goaltender to lose sight of the puck and, well, you know the rest. That all wouldn’t matter though because JOEL FARABEE SCORED HIS FIRST NHL GOAL TO TIE THINGS AT THREE.
The 19-year-old winger took a deflected pass from Michael Raffl in the high-slot and sniped the puck passed Blackwood stick-side to finally earn his first tally at the NHL level after having one taken away from him a few games back. Farabee’s goal ended up pushing this contest to extras, where Couturier scored the Peter Forsberg-style game-winner in the shootout to push the Flyers to victory.
Philadelphia’s second line, Farabee, and Hart were the stories of the matchup. All three of Konecny, Couturier, and Lindblom combined for five points on the evening, putting the offensive dominance they possess together on full display against the Devils.
Farabee was nothing short of phenomenal and nearly scored a game-winning goal himself in OT, but kicked the puck into the net. Hopefully, the floodgates will open for the young forward following this impressive performance, and more of his goals will start to count as the year goes on. Hart was more solid than the statistics would suggest, making some key saves late that helped get the game to overtime. His save on Hall to win the shootout should only boost his confidence and get him back to the level he was playing at to begin the year.
The Flyers are now 6-5-1 on the season. Next game is Saturday against the Toronto Maple Leafs.