Owen Tippett did it again. Every so often, the Philadelphia Flyers winger turns on the switch in his head, his legs, his hands, his feet, and his heart, to instantly become the best hockey player in the world. It comes every so often, in a classic rotation of performances that we have now come to know the rhythms of — going from a couple games of dominance, to scoring but not as loud, to a couple soft games, and then back to scoring, and so on — but it came at the perfect time.
During Game 2 against the Pittsburgh Penguins, Tippett had one of those games. In just about every sense of the two words, he played hockey — was controlling the pace of the game, was doing all the little things right, was showing his physicality in the right moments — and appeared unstoppable during the previously unfathomable 3-0 win that earned the Flyers two straight wins in Pittsburgh and heading back home with a 2-0 series lead.
Owen Tippett dominates Penguins in a sizeable Game 2 effort
Maybe the best part about the game that Tippett had is that it didn’t really show up on the score sheet. If a Flyers forward scored a hat trick, or had a four-point night, we would probably be thinking about their own performance in the same way as Tippett’s on Monday night. There was just something about it that appeared unstoppable. That no one could even conjure up a thought about getting in his way and preventing Tippett from doing what he wanted to do on the ice.
The one single assist that Tippett earned was maybe the most well-earned assist this entire NHL season and the circumstances around it only made it more impressive.
While the Flyers were gripping onto a 1-0 lead late in the second period, they faced yet another Penguins power play that could have been all the difference. Since, heading into this series, that was a massive concern; the fact that the Flyers penalty kill is not all that great and they’re facing a unit with Sidney Crosby and Erik Karlsson and Evgeni Malkin, and that could’ve been the deciding factor for both games in Pittsburgh.
But no, they haven’t even conjured up anything meaningful on the power play through two games and one of the reasons why is because they just got pushed over and had mud kicked all over them by Tippett and Garnet Hathaway.
On the aforementioned penalty kill, Stuart Skinner rimmed around the puck after a clearing from the Flyers in their own zone but was met quickly by Tippett, who was storming downhill to get after the puck. Because of his speed, and the Penguins’ own terrible read of the situation, the Flyers winger was first to the puck and then proceeded to work his way through an onslaught of ugly yellow sweaters and set up something beautiful.
Owen Tippett made several Penguins look so stupid in just a couple seconds.
First, as he was gliding back around the boards, Tippett then sent the puck on his backhand, letting the Penguins defender overskate and actually take out his own teammate along the boards. That little move is something you only see in action movies to make the hero look so damn cool. And then, as elderly Kris Letang hobbled towards Tippett in a very aggressive manner (again, overskating) the Flyers winger calmly just moved the puck and then himself out of the way.
With Tippett’s supreme acceleration, he was able to quickly burst away from the mess of bodies wearing Pittsburgh jerseys behind him, getting into open ice with just one Penguin back and Garnet Hathaway waiting in support in the slot. A quick little fake of a shot and a pass to the veteran grinder, and it was 2-0 Flyers with an immaculate single-handed, shorthanded effort.
It is plays like this that makes Tippett such a valuable and supportive piece to have in the lineup. It might not be possible to do every night, but to have all the physical tools of size and speed and his shot wrapped up into one player, and then start having the confidence to do things on the ice like this, makes Tippett a significant contributor no matter the situation.
And it wasn’t just the assist, but Tippett was massive contributing factor to the Flyers win.
Tippett continued to do the little things, too
After 60 minutes, Tippett finished the game with just that one single assist and uncharacteristically, just one shot on goal with four total attempts. He took a backseat as the trigger man to provide something else in this playoff atmosphere.
We are not joking, we swear. Tippett led the Flyers with seven hits on Monday night. He was a wrecking ball out there on the ice, using the velocity in his legs to deliver punishing blows to send every Penguins player away from controlling the puck. It was that playoff performance you beg some other offensively gifted players to grow into, but Tippett already has it.
And it wasn’t even just about the hits, either. When Tippett was on the ice at 5-on-5, the Flyers had 69.9 percent of the expected goals share, according to hockeystats.com. That is the highest among every Flyer and just five players on this team were able to finish above 50 percent in that category, too.
To make it even more impressive, Tippett played against Erik Karlsson the most out of any Penguins defender, and Sidney Crosby the most out of any Penguins forward. He was up against their top players in their respective positions and just beat them down into a big pile of mush as he marched his team on the way to a significant 2-0 series lead in the biggest games of his career.
Tippett is truly coming into his own in these playoffs and if he continues to put in performances like this, the Flyers are going to have an incredibly hard decision when they need to clear up the winger logjam this summer.
