Flyers dominate Bruins in 4-1 win to start round-robin play

Boston would garner the first scoring chance of the afternoon with a Charlie Coyle bid, but Carter Hart turned aside the chance a little over four minutes in.

The Bruins owned the early play, taking five of the first six shots of the game as the Flyers had issues breaking through the neutral zone with any regularity.

Anders Bjork provided a great chance for the Bruins after moving past Matt Niskanen along the wall, but Hart got a piece of the shot with 11:12 left in the first though Boston would earn a power play on the sequence.

The Flyers would kill it off, needing just one save from Hart on the kill. The kill gave the Orange and Black some momentum as they buzzed the next shift in the Boston end and forcing Jaroslav Halak to freeze things with eight minutes left in the period.

The best chance of the period for the Flyers for Scott Laughton in tight on Halak with 5:29 left, but the netminder came across to deny. It would result in the Flyers’ first power play chance of the afternoon though.

Claude Giroux started the man-advantage by ripping a one-timer off the post behind Halak. That would prove to be the Flyers’ only scoring chance as they came up empty.

No scoring in the period, though the Flyers would carryover some power play time earned by Tyler Pitlick.

Though the power play would expire with nothing doing, things were a bit more open to start the second with a couple odd-man rushes for both teams to start.

Michael Raffl would break open the scoring with 14:27 left in the second on a beautiful passing play started by Travis Sanheim to make it 1-0 Flyers.

As has been the case most of the season, much better second period from the Flyers in every sense.

With 10:29 left in the frame Nate Thompson would extend the Flyers’ lead to 2-0 on great feed from Raffl as the fourth line stepped up again after a rough first period.

Boston would respond by drawing another penalty and going to work on their second power play. Hart and the penalty killers were up to the task again as things stayed 2-0.

Late in the period Hart would make the lead standup on Karson Kuhlman in tight with less than four minutes left after the Flyers left the man wide open in the slot.

But with 1:09 left in the second the Bruins would strike in the form of Chris Wagner jamming one off Robert Hagg’s skate to make it 2-1.

The Flyers weren’t ready to give up their two-goal lead for long, though, as Philippe Myers burst up the middle and rifled a wrist shot past Halak to restore the lead at 3-1 with 20 minutes left.

Early in the third the Flyers would keep the foot on the gas with Laughton ripping one past Halak to make it 4-1 after a bad pinch from a Bruins defender.

The Flyers also had the clamps on defensively, holding the Bruins without a shot on goal through the first 10 minutes of the third.

Not even a third Bruins power play could shake the Flyers, as they calmly dispatched the NHL’s second-ranked power play from the regular season yet again.

A bad moment came with 6:17 left as Raffl went hard into the boards and had to be helped off the ice, favoring his leg on the way off.

Desperate to feel better about themselves, the Bruins emptied their net with four minutes left in regulation.

Their problem though, was that Carter Hart didn’t care for their desperation —or their feelings.

That would be all she wrote as the Flyers skate away with a 4-1 win over the Bruins to start the round-robin with two points up on the board with games left against the Capitals and Lightning for seeding purposes.