Jonathan Toews is one of the best players in the NHL over the last 15 years and is an all-time Chicago Blackhawks great. Chicago has announced that they will not re-sign their captain this offseason and he said goodbye to the Blackhawk faithful in his last home game. However, that sentimentality mattered not to the visiting Philadelphia Flyers.
The Flyers held off the Blackhawks and took their second game in overtime to close out the season 5-4. It’s just the third game in OT that the Flyers have won all season.
It may have been Toews’s night, but Travis Konecny was the star. Just 26 seconds into the game, Konecny stole a puck, shuffled it over to Morgan Frost, who sped down the right side of the rink. He centered it back to Konecny who shot it past goalie Alex Stalock. It would be Konecny’s 30th goal of the season; the first time he has ever hit the 30-goal mark.
Just six minutes later, it was pretty much the same scenario. TK stripped the puck from Jason Dickinson and passed it to Frost who shot it. Konecny grabbed a rebound and fired it home to put the Flyers up 2-0.
Then the Blackhawks came roaring back. First, a minute after Konecny’s second goal, Jujhar Khaira scored on a goal from the side of the net after Felix Sandstrom had to deal with a lot of traffic in front of the net. Kharia found the puck after a rebound and flicked it in for the score. One minute later, Anders Bjork skated around Ivan Provorov and scored on a close range shot past Sandstrom to tie it up in the first.
At the start of the second, the Flyers had dumped the puck into the Hawks’ zone. Stalock played the puck over to Seth Jones. Jones, who is usually smarter than this, passed it over to Khaira. Khaira didn’t see the puck and it went off of his skate. Owen Tippett, however, DID see the puck, grabbed it, and fired it past a diving Stalock, who was still out of place, to get the great heads up goal.
Justin Braun, who may have played in his final NHL game, was on the power play unit so he could get his 200th career point. While he was on the ice for a power play goal, he did not get the point. He passed it over to Tippett who passed it to Konecny who gave it to Noah Cates for a power play goal.
But again, the Blackhawks would come back. And this time, it was poetic justice. Toews would score on a power play goal. Andreas Athanasiou, who would score the game tying goal in the third period, fired a shot at Sandstrom. Toews was coming across, redirected the puck, and snuck it past Sandstrom into the net. It’s fitting that Toews would score a goal for the last time for the Chicago crowd.
Toews would almost be the hero of the game. In overtime, he stripped the puck from Morgan Frost and went to the races with Frost trailing behind, diving to prevent a goal. Toews fired off a beauty of a shot that Sandstrom was able to stop in time. A few seconds later, Provorov took a pass and went up the ice, skated between Dickinson and Jones and fired off the game winner past Stalock.
Konecny had four points in this one, two goals and two assists. Frost and Tippett also had two point games. Sandstrom, for his effort, stopped 34 of 38 shots for the win. Now the Flyers head into an offseason with a lot of questions hanging over their heads. However, the draft is coming up and the Phantoms are in the playoffs. It will be a great chance to see some of the Flyers’ future stars showcase their talents.