Generally, when a team outshoots the opposition 42-27, they come away with the victory. But on the night that served as the Wells Fargo Center’s Halloween party, the hockey gods were at their most mischievous towards the Philadelphia Flyers, just a calendar day early.
The Flyers stormed back from a 4-2 second period deficit to tie the game, but could not keep the Penguins off the scoreboard in the third period, as Evgeni Malkin scored the game-winner with 11:27 left. Philadelphia carried the play at even strength, finishing with a 60.32% score-adjusted Corsi, but that wasn’t enough to earn the victory as they fell by a final score of 5-4. Jakub Voracek scored two goals for the Flyers, Wayne Simmonds chipped in with a goal and an assist, and Radko Gudas also finished with two points on the night. But Pittsburgh’s stars buried Philadelphia — both Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin scored two goals to lead their team to a win.
It’s easy to forget, but the Flyers got off to a fantastic start in this one. Slick passing allowed Philadelphia to generate entry after entry, while active sticks in neutral zone lanes were preventing the Penguins from getting anything started offensively. The result was a deluge of shots in the direction of Marc-Andre Fleury, and midway through the period, it finally paid off. A Jakub Voracek blast from the point eluded Fleury, and the Flyers had jumped out to a first-period lead.
The pressure continued. Just three minutes later, Shayne Gostisbehere prevented a potential Penguins’ clear and dumped the puck back down low, where Brayden Schenn retrieved it and sent a perfect backhand pass to Wayne Simmonds, who sent the puck into the wide open net that Fleury had abandoned. With the Pens’ goalie clearly not at his best early and the Flyers dominating in terms of puck possession, it was looking like a great night at the Wells Fargo Center.
Enter Sidney Crosby. On a rush with four minutes remaining in the period, Crosby finished off a slick passing play by roofing the puck short side past a surprised Steve Mason. But Crosby wasn’t done. With Ivan Provorov off the ice for a hooking minor, the Pittsburgh captain struck again, this time blasting a one-timer past Mason for a power play goal, and tying the game at two.
At this point, the Flyers just wanted to regroup and go into the locker room with a tie score so that they could rehash the positives of the period and clean up the defensive issues. Unfortunately, the Penguins were not about to let that happen. Matt Cullen scored just 12 seconds after Provorov exited the box due to Crosby’s goal, getting to a loose puck behind the Flyers’ net and beating Mason to the far post for a wraparound goal. Just like that, Philadelphia’s strong start was a distant memory and the Flyers hit the intermission knowing that they would have to chase the game.
Dave Hakstol immediately changed things up to start the second period, swapping Michal Neuvirth in for Steve Mason. But the start of the period was all Pittsburgh, as Neuvirth was quickly forced to make a few tough stops. The Flyers slowly played themselves back into the game, however. They almost tied things up five minutes in, but a stellar backcheck from Chris Kunitz prevented Travis Konecny from scoring his second NHL goal. Still, the Flyers earned a power play on the sequence, and appeared poised to even the contest.
Instead, Marc-Andre Fleury held down the fort, making a number of tough saves on the man advantage, including one left-handed larceny of Jakub Voracek. The Penguins survived, and minutes later, they would take advantage of yet another Philadelphia defensive zone miscue to extend their lead to two goals. Sean Couturier made a rare poor breakout pass, leading to a tic-tac-toe Penguins passing sequence that ended with Evgeni Malkin ripping a shot past Neuvirth. That made the score 4-2, and the Wells Fargo crowd was getting obviously restless.
Leave it to Radko Gudas to spark a comeback. After Voracek drew his second penalty of the game, the Flyers went back to the power play but struggled to create much of anything. That was until Gudas made three straight blocks of Pittsburgh clear attempts in the span of a few seconds, catching the entire Penguins’ squad up ice and leaving Giroux all alone in the slot to blast a slapshot by Fleury. It was the captain’s first goal of the season, but Gudas’ hard-earned secondary assist was the key to the tally.
Following Giroux’s goal, the Flyers took full control at 5v5. But the game-tying goal would not be scored at even strength — it would instead come via a rare penalty shot opportunity. Brandon Manning’s on-point stretch pass sent Voracek on a breakaway, forcing Brian Dumoulin to obstruct Philadelphia’s star winger. Voracek would not waste the ensuing penalty shot, totally fooling Fleury with a beautiful deke before flipping the puck over the prone Pittsburgh goalie. The Flyers had made it all the way back.
Philadelphia nearly re-took the lead at the end of the period, following a Scott Wilson trip of Mark Streit with just 50 seconds left in the second. With time running down, Giroux found himself open in the slot but instead blasted his one-timer wide, setting up a key PP opportunity to start the third period.
The third period-opening power play proved fruitless, however, with only a decent chance from Voracek with traffic in front to show for it. The Flyers kept plugging at even strength, however, peppering Fleury with shots. Ivan Provorov even rang one off the post, but no one could beat the Pittsburgh netminder. All it took was one bad shift and one bad bounce to render all of their hard work pointless. Malkin collected a loose puck in front to beat Neuvirth, as the Penguins received the good break that the Flyers had been praying they would get. Philadelphia continued to carry play through the remainder of the period, but simply could not get that equalizing goal, leading to a deflating loss.
