Flyers shutout by Vasilevskiy, Lightning, in rare home loss

Three Stars

1. Carter Hart

Hart was great in this game for the Flyers, and kept them in it when they didn’t deserve to be. He continues his stellar play at home in the friendly confines of the Wells Fargo Center, Although he doesn’t get the win in this game, he absolutely deserved it.

2. Sean Couturier

Couturier was one of the better Flyers forwards in a game where really no one stood out. He was as strong as ever defensively, and was one of the best play-driving forwards on the team in this game, and somehow his expected goals numbers were extremely good.

3. Travis Konecny

Speaking of one of the few forwards who were on their game in this one, TK was one of them. The entire first line honestly could have been put here, but if I did that I wouldn’t have known who the hell else to say. He was flying out there as usual, and seemed to be on the ice for the few quality chances they actually had in this game.

Answering the bell

1. Can the Flyers slow down the Tampa power play?

Surprisingly, yes! The Flyers’ penalty kill was superb vs. Tampa, including a huge four-minute double minor kill early in the game. This has been a great couple of games for the PK, now the key will be maintaining this effort. It’s been much improved from the past couple of seasons, but there is still clearly room for improvement.

2. Can the defense hold it together?

For the most part, yes. I don’t think it would be accurate to call this a great defensive effort from the Flyers, given the amount of shot attempts they gave up, and where they came from. However, they limited the Lightning to one goal and that has to be recognized.

Play of the game

Not much to choose from here, so it kind of has to be this save from Andrei Vasilevskiy.