Provorov’s Overtime Winner Lifts Flyers To 2-1 Victory Over Bruins

The Philadelphia Flyers and Boston Bruins met at Wells Fargo Center on Monday night in South Philadelphia for the Flyers’ fourth preseason matchup of the year. The Flyers were coming off their first win of the preseason on Saturday against Washington and looked to keep things rolling. They did just that tonight with a 2-1 victory over the Bruins at home in overtime.

Carter Hart got the nod in net for Philadelphia while Jeremy Swayman would start for the Bruins in this one. Swayman was also in goal for Boston’s 4-2 win over the Flyers on Thursday as well.

The Flyers had plenty of good chances in the first period to score, but Swayman was very sharp early on. Philadelphia would get the game’s first power play at 9:14 of the period after Anton Blidh was called for roughing against Connor Bunnaman, and the Flyers would have a chance to grab the game’s opening goal. Unfortunately, they could not solve Swayman or the Bruins’ penalty kill and the game would remain scoreless.

Philadelphia would get another crack at the power play with 1:02 remaining in the frame. Samuel Asselin was whistled for cross-checking against Nicolas Aubé-Kubel and the Flyers would get two more minutes to try and score with a man up. The Flyers’ result would remain the same, and the Bruins killed off the penalty.

Shortly after that, the period would end with a 0-0 score after twenty minutes. Philadelphia led the shots on goal battle 9-4 and were the better team for the majority of the the first period.

The second period began to play out much as the first had, with no goals but plenty of shots. The Flyers would end up getting their third power play at 10:07 of the middle frame after Nick Wolff was sent to the box for hooking against Cam Atkinson.

Philadelphia once again couldn’t score and the man-advantage was short-lived after Ryan Ellis was sent off for roughing on Connor Clifton with 20 seconds remaining in the power play. After the brief 4-on-4 time and setting up their open power play, Boston would finally break through with 6:35 to play in the period thanks to Jack Studnicka on a broken play in front of the Flyers net.

Elliot Desnoyers, appearing in his first game of the preseason, got things going physically with 4:54 to play as he dropped the gloves with John Moore. Moore took exception to Desnoyers’ physical play and Desnoyers obliged to the fight and wound up on top of Moore.

It was definitely a spark the Flyers needed, and after Wolff was called for his second hooking minor of the game, this time on James van Riemsdyk. And they were able to finally light the lamp.

After a furious Philadelphia forecheck, Keith Yandle set up Sean Couturier for a beautiful one-timer that beat Swayman to the short side to get the Flyers on the board with 19 seconds left in the second period.

1-1 is how the score would shake out after forty minutes of action in South Philadelphia. The Flyers led the Bruins in shots 17-11 in the period and 26-15 total at that point. They certainly found their game again later in the second period and finally broke through.

The third period began with another addition to the Bruins’ parade to the penalty box, as Jack Ahcan tripped up Wyatte Wylie just 1:39 into the frame and the Flyers would get their fifth man-advantage of the game. The Bruins learned from their mistakes and did not allow another goal despite more fantastic puck movement and pressure from the Flyers.

The Bruins would get another power play of their own at 4:26 after Ellis was sent to the penalty box for another roughing minor, this time on Oskar Steen. Philadelphia was able to hold off Boston’s power play unit with Ellis spectating and kept the game even at one goal apiece.

Both teams would trade shots as the game wore on and there was a good pace to the action, but Hart and Swayman would keep things evened up. At the end of it all, we would need overtime to determine a winner in this one. Philadelphia led the shots on goal battle 34-25 after sixty minutes and had also won 51% of the faceoffs up to that point.

The Bruins originally had a good chance early on, but the Flyers held them off and rushed up ice. Travis Konecny and Ivan Provorov had numbers on the rush, and Konecny dished the puck to Provorov for the one-timer to seal the deal and beat Swayman for the 2-1 victory.

As usual with the preseason, there was another exhibition shootout afterwards regardless of the result. Konecny beat Swayman relatively easily in the first round, and Hart made three straight saves to win the shootout 1-0 as well.

3 STARS OF THE GAME – 1) Sean Couturier – PHI, 2) Jeremy Swayman – BOS, 3) Keith Yandle – PHI