Wrap: Toronto Tramples Flyers, 6-0
One night after putting forth one of their best 60-minute performances of the season in a 4-0 home win over the New York Rangers, the Philadelphia Flyers were atrocious in most every aspect of the game in getting crushed on the road by the Toronto Maple Leafs in a 6-0 slaughter at the Scotiabank Arena. The Flyers are now 1-4-1 over their last six games to fall to 10-11-2 on the season.
There is plenty of blame to go around for why the Flyers' season thus far has been so mediocre. One vital factor has been goaltending that, apart from injured veteran Brian Elliott, has been sub NHL-caliber on many nights. Even if everything else was magically solved -- the penalty kill, the struggles of Ivan Provorov and Shayne Gostisbehere, the lack of a third line center, the inconsistent offense, the too-frequent poor starts -- and even if upper management demanded immediate changes on the coaching staff, it would be tough to be much more than a .500 team with the goaltending the Flyers have received. That is especially true of late in all but one of the games (the win over the Rangers) since Elliott went down in the third period of a 3-0 home loss to New Jersey.
On Saturday night, the Flyers did not take care of the puck. Several goals they allowed started with bad turnovers and/or Toronto attackers eluding defenders. That said, a team needs its goaltenders to make saves, too. While Toronto generated legitimate chances and were quick to turn puck possession changes into counterattacks, most of the goals the Leafs scored were not impossible saves. Team play and goalie play are symbiotic. It is unfair and inaccurate to solely blame the goalies -- for example, the second Leafs' goal was a breakaway off an up-ice blocked shot -- but, in the first period of Saturday's game, the Flyers actually could not have fared much worse if they'd played 6-on-5 with an empty net behind them. That does not excuse the poor performance of the entire team but it's something that is almost impossible work around.
One night after posting a 30-save shutout of the Rangers, waiver wire pickup Cal Pickard yielded four goals on six shots in 12:20 of work. For the season, he has a 4.01 GAA and an abysmal .863 save percentage even with the Rangers game to prop up his overall numbers.
Saturday's game marked the second time in three games that the Flyers dug themselves a 4-0 hole in the first period and the third time in four games in which the team had to contend with a four-goal deficit. Last Saturday, the Flyers pulled off a third period comeback to rescue a point in a 6-5 overtime home loss to Tampa Bay. On Wednesday, the Flyers at least made a push after the first period in Buffalo to get back with 4-2 and generate a host of (unsuccessful) scoring chances to get back within a goal before the Sabres finally pulled away again late in the game. On this night, there was nothing to show but a 34-save shutout for Toronto backup goaltender Garrett Sparks.
Anthony Stolarz, who had only gotten into three games this season for the AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms (one start sandwiched between two far-spaced relief appearances) and was only in Toronto because fellow Lehigh Valley recall Alex Lyon who is day-to-day with a lower-body injury, found himself in the Flyers goal crease for the rest of the night. Stolarz battled hard and performed commendably, stopping 33 of 35 shots. However, the game had already gone off the rails by that point, and Toronto still managed to extend its lead to six goals before the second period was through.
All six Toronto goals were scored at 5-on-5. There was no special teams play at all in this game; nary a penalty on either side or any coincidental infractions whistled.
Andreas Johnsson scored a first period hat trick for his third, fourth and fifth goals of the season. All three goals came at Pickard's expense. It wasn't quite a natural hat trick, because Patrick Marleau (5th) scored an unassisted goal in front -- three of Toronto's four goals in the opening stanza went as unassisted tallies -- to make it 3-0. In the latter half of the second period, Josh Leivo (3rd) and John Tavares (15th) finished off setups from Mitch Marner (23rd and 24th assists) to create a 6-0 lead.
With the game long since decided, the third period was strictly garbage time. The Flyers outshot Toronto, 14-10, in the meaningless final frame.
The Flyers play the Ottawa Senators at the Wells Fargo Center on Tuesday night.
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Phantoms Fall to Providence, 6-3
The Lehigh Valley Phantoms followed up a solid home win on Friday over the Hershey Bears with a clunker on Saturday against a last-place Providence Bruins team that came to the PPL Center with a 6-8-3 record. The Phantoms sustained a 6-3 loss.
The Phantoms jumped out to a 2-0 in the first 67 seconds of the game on goals by Greg Carey (12th) and Nicolas Aube-Kubel (4th). The rest of the night, more or less, belonged to Providence. Lehigh Valley briefly retook a 3-2 lead in the second period on a puck-luck goal credited to Cole Bardreau (4th). However, the Bruins went on to forge ahead and never looked back. The Phantoms, trailing 4-3 to start the third period, got outshot by a 12-4 margin in the third period.
In goal, Carter Hart's inconsistent rookie season continued. He was very good in backstopping the team to victory on Friday night against Hershey and ineffective in this game. There were least two fluky or stoppable goals the 20-year-old netminder would have liked to have back among the six pucks that got past him. He finished the night with 32 saves on 38 shots. Considering that he was pulled early in the Phantoms' comeback win in Providence on Nov. 16, it would have been nice to see him have a stronger performance in his return-match opportunity against the same club.
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Big Game for Frost
On a miserable night for the Flyers and Phantoms and a generally quiet night for most of the Flyers junior and collegiate prospects who were in action, there is at least one stellar night to report from the Flyers' farm system. Flyers 2017 first-round pick Morgan Frost racked up five assists in a 7-4 win for the Ontario Hockey League's Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds against the Owen Sound Attack (featuring fellow Flyers prospect Maksim Sushko). For the season, Frost now has 46 points (16 goals, 30 assists) in 26 games played.
Flyers 2017 second-round pick Isaac Ratcliffe's Guelph Storm club had a rough night of their own against the host Barrie Colts, getting pummeled by an 8-2 count. On the bright side, Ratcliffe did score his 18th goal of the season. He has 29 points in 24 games played.