Flyers can’t hold 3-0 lead, fall to Golden Knights in shootout originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
The Flyers coughed up a 3-0 lead Monday night en route to a 5-4 shootout loss to the Golden Knights at the Wells Fargo Center.
They relinquished a 4-3 edge in the third period when Tanner Pearson scored with 8:05 minutes left. Vegas won the game with a tally from Jack Eichel in the skills competition.
Travis Konecny, Matvei Michkov and Owen Tippett came up empty in the shootout for the Flyers.
The Flyers had a power play in overtime but couldn’t convert.
Michkov, Morgan Frost, Sean Couturier and Emil Andrae all found the back of the net for the Flyers. Andrae’s marker was the first of his NHL career and gave the Flyers what appeared to be a commanding 3-0 lead just 28 seconds into the second period.
But the Golden Knights turned it on and the Flyers weren’t very good in the second period.
“You take out seven or eight minutes of that second period where there are some turnovers on the wall, other than that, I thought we played a really good hockey game,” John Tortorella said. “One of our better showings in the offensive zone as far as puck movement, people moving without it. Take out seven or eight minutes and that’s a really good game by us. But that’s a good team, they capitalized.”
Tortorella’s club saw overtime for the sixth time in the last nine games. It dropped to 3-2 in the skills competition.
The Flyers (9-10-3) went 2-2-1 on their homestand. They’ve earned at least a point in 10 of their last 15 games (8-5-2) after starting the season 1-5-1.
“We still have another step to get to,” Couturier said. “Can’t really be satisfied, to be honest.”
The Golden Knights (14-6-2) were without some key pieces in William Karlsson (personal reasons), Mark Stone (lower body) and Alex Pietrangelo (upper body).
The Flyers open the 2025 portion of their schedule when they visit Vegas on Jan. 2
• Ivan Fedotov made 26 saves on 30 shots. He denied one of two attempts in the shootout.
The Golden Knights got after him with 19 shots in the second period, scoring three goals to whittle the Flyers’ lead down to 4-3 at intermission.
The 6-foot-7 netminder wasn’t quick playing the puck behind his net when Eichel got Vegas on the board.
Under five minutes later, Scott Laughton had a turnover in the offensive zone that sprung the Golden Knights the other way on their second goal. Ivan Barbashev finished the sequence to make it 3-2.
After the Flyers pushed their lead back to two, Couturier was whistled for hooking and Pavel Dorofeyev scored just five seconds into Vegas’ power play.
“I think we just didn’t manage it properly, didn’t manage the game well,” Couturier said. “Late in the second, we’re up 4-2, bad turnover by me, penalty and next thing you know, it’s 4-3 going into the third. If you’re up two there, it’s probably a tougher comeback for them in the third. I take responsibility for that one.”
Fedotov has given up four goals in each of his last two starts. He has faced a lot of shots, 67 in total.
Golden Knights goalie Ilya Samsonov entered 11-2-0 with a 2.52 goals-against average and .910 save percentage in his career against the Flyers. The 11 wins were his most against any club. He stopped 32 of the Flyers’ 36 shots Monday night for win No. 12.
• Andrae and Rasmus Ristolainen were each a plus-3 and very effective together.
• Tortorella was mostly pleased with Frost’s defensive effort last Saturday, the center’s first game back from a stretch of four healthy scratches in five games.
But the head coach wanted to see Frost’s offense come to life. And he got his wish Monday night.
Frost opened the game’s scoring by redirecting a Ristolainen shot 8:51 minutes into the action. It was his second goal in 18 games. From there, you could see his confidence spike.
He picked up an assist on Michkov’s goal, which restored some order for the Flyers in the second period, cushioning their lead back to 4-2. For Michkov, it was his eighth goal and 17th point in 20 games.
The helper gave Frost his second multi-point game of the season. The 25-year-old has overcome slow starts in the past. We’ll see if Monday night’s output gets him going.
• Over four minutes into the third period, Garnet Hathaway had a painful blocked shot and immediately went up the tunnel. He appeared to be shaking his hand. The 33-year-old winger returned to the bench about four minutes later.
• Jamie Drysdale (upper body) was out for a seventh straight game and Samuel Ersson (lower body) missed his sixth game in a row. Both players are considered day to day.
• In conjunction with the league-wide initiative, the Flyers held their annual Hockey Fights Cancer night.
To bring awareness to all of those impacted by cancer, players wore white and lavender jerseys to the arena. Fans can bid on those jerseys here at FlyersCharities.com.
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• The Flyers, amid a stretch of four games in six days, head to Nashville, Tennessee for a matchup Wednesday with the Predators (8 p.m. ET/NBCSP+).
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