Flyers give up late goal, lose in shootout

Ivan Fedotov

 

Just when it looked like the Flyers might extend their winning streak, along came Zach Werenski.
The Columbus Blue Jacket defenseman scored the second of two goals with 4:37 to play to at Nationwide Arena in Columbus, Ohio to tie the score at 2-2.
From there, the Blue Jackets went on to prevail in a shootout. Kent Johnson and Kirill Marchenko scored for Columbus in the tiebreaker. The Flyers’ Travis Konecny and Matvei Michkov failed to score for the Flyers.
The Flyers were trying to win their third straight game and the chances looked pretty good when a goal by Owen Tippett at 8:13 of the third period broke a 1-1 tie.
But then Werenski took over.
The Blue Jackets won their fifth straight game and the Flyers had to settle for a point.
Philadelphia now has just one win in eight attempts in the second game of back-to-back situations.
Tippett connected on a shot from the top of the circles for his 13th goal of the season.
Flyers goaltender Ivan Fedotov took the loss. The Blue Jackets’ Daniil Tarasov got the win.
“That (second Werenski) goal took some life out of us,” Tippett said. “But I thought we stayed patient. It would have been nice to get the extra point. We’ll take the one.”
While there were no goals scored in the second period, there was plenty of physical play.
The major incident involved Sanheim and Travis Konecny from the Flyers and Columbus tough guy Mathieu Olivier.
Olivier started the donnybrook by leveling Sanheim in the corner. The yelling started and continued over to the benches where Konecny leveled the Blue Jacket player. Konecny was charged a double-minor but the Flyers managed to kill off that shorthanded situation.
Bobby Brink kicked off the Flyers’ scoring at 3:44 of the first period to end a 20-game goal drought.
The play unfolded with Nick Seeler hanging on to the puck at the top of the slot, then spotting Brink open at the right post. Brink’s shot eluded goalie Daniil Tarasov. The right wing had not scored since Nov. 29 against the New York Rangers.
Brink has been playing well on the Noah Cates’ line but just wasn’t getting much in the way of rewards.
In a televised first intermission interview, Brink indicated he wasn’t all that concerned about the goal dry spell because the line overall has been playing so well.
“It feels good,” Brink said. “I’ve had some chances, they just haven’t been going in recently. But our line has been playing well and that’s what matters.”
What’s the secret to the line’s success?
“I think we’re hard on pucks,” Brink said. “Close support to one another. I think getting pucks back if we lose it. And a lot of O-zone time.”
Added Tortorella, when asked about Brink’s confidence level: “We’ll find out when he plays his next game.”
The line of Brink, Noah Cates and Tyson Foerster turned in another strong performance.
“They’re a confident group of both sides of the puck,” Tortorella said. “They can score, they can check. The three of them are very important here as we try to keep our traction.”
Columbus tied the score at 10:37. Werenski jumped a cross-ice pass at the point and set sail on a breakaway. Fedotov had no chance on Werenski’s rising shot to the top left shelf.
Werenski’s two goals give him 15 this season, tops for defensemen in the NHL. His 50 points also lead all backliners.

>Another strong game for Fedotov

Fedotov has put together several strong performances and that’s encouraging to Tortorella.
“Big saves,” the coach said. “Again, he’s gone through a lot, being in and out. . .shuffled to (number) three. Now he’s come back in. He made some big saves today.”
Tippett’s been impressed with Fedotov’s composure.
“He’s been tremendous, he’s given us a chance,” Tippett said. “Everyone knows there’s a rotation going on and that can be tough. He made some huge saves for us tonight and kept us in the game.”

>Short shots

The Flyers get a day off Wednesday, then head to Long Island for a Thursday night game against the Islanders. It starts a stretch of seven out of eight games against New York area teams. . .Going into Tuesday night’s game, Konecny had moved up to 13th in NHL scoring with 20 goals/30 points. . .With back-to-back two-goal power-play games (Anaheim, Florida), the Flyers moved up to 28th place in the NHL at 15.8 percent, nearly a percentage point improvement since before the two games.

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About Wayne Fish 2701 Articles
Wayne Fish has been covering the Flyers since 1976, a stint which includes 18 Stanley Cup Finals, four Winter Olympics and numerous other international events.