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Takeaways from Flyers 5-3 win over the Islanders

Flyers find some revenge in a more meaningful way over the Islanders.

Jan 16, 2025; Elmont, New York, USA; Philadelphia Flyers goaltender Samuel Ersson (33) watches the play as he defends the net in the second period against the New York Islanders at UBS Arena. Mandatory Credit: Wendell Cruz-Imagn Images

The Flyers kicked off the first of their trio of games against the Islanders in the month of January — what a weird schedule this is this year — and though it would prove to be a difficult game for them, both in matchup and emotional context, they managed to come away with a huge win over a divisional opponent, and a big statement made in the process.

The Basics

First period: 9:21- Bo Horvat (Nelson)PPG
Second period: 5:15- Sean Couturier (Farabee, Michkov), 9:29- Garnet Hathaway (Konecny, Sanheim)SHG, 13:41- Morgan Frost (Tippett, Konecny)
Third period: 0:30- Mathew Barzal (Dobson), 5:16- Cam York (Farabee, Couturier), 17:16- Anders Lee (Horvath, Palmieri)PPG, 18:43- Noah Cates (Konecny)EN
SOG: 24 (PHI) – 30 (NYI)

Some Takeaways

An early exit

There’s a lot to unpack from this game, but the big highlight of it all was the early exit of Ryan Poehling, after he found himself absolutely leveled on a high hit from the Islanders’ Maxim Tsyplakov.

Poehling was done on the ice for a few moments before being helped off the ice by teammates and heading down the tunnel. Unsurprisingly, he was ruled out for the remainder of the game, and the Flyers were left to shake off the emotions from seeing a favorite teammate going down like that, and to battle back in a game without one of their forwards.

There are some larger questions opened up by this — if Poehling is out for an extended period of time, who comes into the lineup, who steps into that fourth line center role, primarily — but the chief concern is Poehling’s wellbeing after a hit as nasty as that.

A note on officiating

We try to avoid spending too much valuable energy lamenting the officiating situation, but this game was so messy and unbelievable that we would be remiss if we didn’t mention it at all. That hit on Poehling that we just highlighted, though called a major on the ice and leaving them opportunity to be reviewed, was ultimately wiped off the board entirely, though it easily could (and probably should) have been called at the very least any number of minor infractions. The officials then immediately followed that up by calling a ticky tacky slash on Joel Farabee — the slash that was undeniably a slash, and a call that sent a clear message that the officials felt that their non-call on Tsyplakov was rightful and that they were going to call things tight, at least on the Flyers, in an attempt to keep things from getting out of hand. And while the calls did even out by the time the third period rolled around, the feeling of lopsidedness in favor of the Islanders early was undeniable, and felt like the officials swinging a bat at an already agitated hornets nest.

Making a statement

Given the way things were trending early, between the predatory hit thrown on their teammate and the lack of justice leveled by the officials, it was almost expected that this game would begin to get out of hand, and that the Flyers might well start running around, looking to do some damage on the physical front and get some revenge on their own terms. And while they did find some revenge in a way, it’s not in that way that we expected. Instead of hitting the ice for the second period and just running around headhunting, the Flyers got to work and began to take over the game offensively.

The second period was a pretty dominant one for the Flyers. They weren’t without their moments of slippage, to be sure, but they were able to draw back even early and build themselves a two-goal cushion by the time the intermission hit. The shorthanded goal for Hathaway was a huge one, and a pretty strong statement — if there was going to be any player on this team who was going to look to mic things up physically in defense of Poehling, it was going to be Hathaway, but he was able to reign things in an put up a goal that likely hurt the Islanders worse than any hit he could deal. Thing almost got away from the Flyers in the third period and that isn’t lost on us, but they did well to play a bend but don’t break type of final frame. It wasn’t pretty, but it worked.

Ersson hangs in there

It was a big game for the Flyers on the offensive side, no doubt about it, but they couldn’t have pulled off the win if it wasn’t for another quite solid showing from Sam Ersson. Now, it wasn’t perfect, and there’s undoubtedly at least one of those goals that he would particularly want back, but he came up huge for the skaters when they got themselves into some dicey situations. We talked about the bend but don’t break approach to the game as it went on for the team, and Ersson seemed to be channeling that ethos as well. All in all, he came away with stops on 26 of the 29 shots he faced. It wasn’t the flashiest of efforts for him, but it was another solid one all the same, and it was critical in both securing this win and also in building his game back up in the right direction after his brief layoff.

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