Travis Konecny has not been showing up on the score sheet in this first round against the Pittsburgh Penguins, but he is doing exactly what he needs to do. The Philadelphia Flyers still live and breathe in rhythm with Konecny on the ice and he is a major reason why they have now earned a 3-0 series lead over their archrivals.
If you just looked at a bunch of numbers from Wednesday night’s 5-2 Flyers win in Game 3, and saw that Konecny finished the game with zero goals, zero assists, four penalty minutes, a shot, a blocked shot, and three hits in 16:28 time-on-ice; there would probably be some complaints about a major part of this Flyers team “not showing up”. But that’s why you watch the games. Because Konecny showed up in maybe the most major way possible and fully empowered the Flyers to the eventual win that took full control of the series.
Travis Konecny majorly embarrassed the Penguins in Game 3
At the peak of his powers, Konecny can wriggle his way under the opponent’s skin and make them go absolutely insane. It is a skillset that only so many players have and can execute in almost every single game. But the Flyers veteran winger has regularly been that type of player and in the biggest games of his career, he is doing exactly what he needs to do.
It all blew up early in the second period. With the Penguins up 1-0 thanks to an early-game goal scored by Evgeni Malkin, Konecny saw a loose puck dribble in front of Stuart Skinner after a little bit of some build-up play and almost immediately after he took a shot and the whistle blew, Bryan Rust was on top of him, delivering blows to Konecny’s head seemingly out of nowhere.
Watching it live felt like watching someone’s brain officially break on the ice. There was no reason whatsoever, that was obvious, for the Penguins winger to act like he did — to jump and try to cave in Konecny’s head with a Neanderthalic attitude. It came out of nowhere it stunned most fans and even the broadcasters covering the game, truly wondering if someone was said or something serious happened.
But no, Konecny threw his elbow back after Rust tied him up and that just set him off. Looking like the badly behaved toddler throwing a tantrum because he was told that he’s had too many fruit snacks, Rust pounced and would not give up trying to stuff Konecny’s face in with his glove as much as possible.
It was frankly insane to see and insane to think that that would be a reaction from a grown man. Just zero barrier between being normal and then having something break in his head to acting out in such a way. Yeah, Konecny threw the elbow as a “Get off of me, dude” way and it could have been received poorly, but that felt like an overblown reaction.
But then, Konecny works his magic.
After both forwards got to their feet and got a linesman involved, Konecny was ready to settle the skirmish in the way that the National Hockey League actually allows: To drop the gloves and throw some punches. But of course, Rust being who he is, he declined in a cowardly way and decided that he would rather throw punches when Konecny is laying down on the ice already.
The image of Konecny willingly dropping his gloves — technically a penalty, but whatever — and Rust just standing there sheepishly, cowering behind the linesman and not wanting to engage in anything that would be considered answering for his actions, is just perfect.
Konecny gave Rust the opportunity to meet him face-to-face and the Penguins veteran said no and skated away in a pure act of cowardice that should be shamed. But, there are obviously bigger stories coming out of this game — like the fact that the Flyers have a strangehold on the Penguins and are going to put those old veterans out to pasture.
And rightfully so, Konecny was not just about to let Rust deny answering the call without getting an earful.
That is what we’re talking about. Konecny is just the perfect player. He can soak up all of the intensity and all of the drama surrounding this Battle of Pennsylvania at a crucial part of the Flyers’ build back to contention, and then be the one responsible of pouring out the correct dose. Walking that fine line in just the right way at just the right time to then give his team the advantage.
Because this moment where Konecny was the fireball we know he can be, was truly the turning point in Game 3.
The Flyers earned a power play after the several penalties were tallied for each team and in a moment of everything coming together and everyone on this team doing their job, the game was tied directly because of all those events that happened just minutes earlier, thanks to Trevor Zegras.
As big of a moment you can possibly imagine. And the Flyers didn’t stop there. Within the next seven minutes, the Flyers scored two more goals, coming off the sticks of Rasmus Ristolainen and Nick Seeler of all people, to give them the lead that eventually earned them the victory.
While we can only guess how players felt during the game, we would like to think that the very long stretch of Konecny getting fired up in reaction to Rust being a big pissbaby led to the Flyers coming together and willing those three goals into existence.
Konecny didn’t even earn a single point but he led the team in maybe something more important than scoring goals: Making the Penguins look really, really stupid.
