Recap: Canes Drop Tough Battle Against Flyers and Lose 4-3 (Flyers)

Flyers

Recap: Canes Drop Tough Battle Against Flyers and Lose 4-3

By Ben Case

Oct 30, 2016 • 8:44 pm

0comment-bubble

The Carolina Hurricanes (2-4-1) lost 4-3 in tough battle again the Philadelphia Flyers (4-5-1) in a back-and-forth game. Both teams were hungry for the win and played a very competitive game that saw a few highlight reel goals and some stellar saves. Ultimately, the Canes struggled on many of the key points that would help their chances for getting a win. The three biggest issues they faced throughout the evening were problems with turnovers, allowing point opportunities and capitalizing on the powerplay.

The Canes come out storming in the first period and Skinner showed that he was going to be an offensive threat again. At 24, Skinner is the youngest active NHL player with 20 or more multi-goal games—the entire evening he was a threat and used his great hands, speed and hockey instincts to create opportunities. Neuvirth made an exceptional early save which was critical for a Flyers team who has allowed tons of goals and struggled recently.

Neuvirth was critical for the Flyers win early in the first, as well as throughout the entire 3rd period. The Canes strong start got them out to an early shot advantage, however, the Flyers managed the surge and fought back during the second half. Jordon Staal made an excellent play at the beginning of when the Flyers were gaining momentum to ensure that the game remained scoreless around the mid-mark of the first.

However, the Flyers continued to push and they eventually converted on their first PP chance of the evening, as Gotisbehere got his second goal of the season as he snapped a low shot past Ward which appeared to be screened and/or deflected by Pesce. One of the problems in the loss to the Flyers earlier this month was that the Canes struggled to cover the point, as well as preventing point shots from getting to the net. Tonight, the Flyers D-men and point shots continued to be an issue for the Canes. The rest of the first was relatively back and forth and saw the Flyers take a 1-0 lead into intermission and hold a 12-9 shot advantage.

The Canes come out strong in the second and found the net a minute into the period on a goal that Neurvirth thought he drew contact on. It looked more like he initiated the contact in front and Justin Faulk was credited with his second goal of the season—both of which are against the Flyers.

Make sure you get your free side of Queso at Moe’s tomorrow:

Shortly after the Canes took the lead, the Flyers responded with another goal from the point by Radko Gudas. The goal was his first of the season and was scored very similarly to the Flyers first one. The major difference for this one though was that the shot came from Cam Ward’s glove side as opposed to his blocker side. Both of the goals appeared that Ward was playing too deep in the net and may have benefited from at least getting to the top of his crease. Jeff Skinner responded to tie the game three minutes after the Flyers took the 2-1 advantage on a nice backdoor play that snuck through Neuvirth. Skinner made an exceptional play with his skate to stop, control and collect the puck for the goal. He had 3 goals and an assist in the two home games this weekend and looked exceptional throughout the evening.

Less than two minutes later, Victor Stalberg poked a loose puck past Provorov for a breakaway goal on Neuvirth. Stalberg used his speed to blow past Provorov, collect the puck and rifle home a 5-hole shot that trickled through Neuvirth. The Caniac fans errupted and it appeared that the Canes would potentially be able to build on the momentum.

Late in the second period, the Flyers tied the game 3-3 as Giroux connected on a one-timer from the slot off a feed from Simmonds. The play was able to happen because of a poor turnover by Aho—on a neutral zone rush, Aho passed the puck from the boards as he tried to find a streaking Staal. Unfortunately, the pass was off target, the Flyers turned it the other way, dumped it deep, beat the Canes to the puck and found a wide open Giroux for his second of the season.

While the Canes and Flyers were making adjustments for the third period, Caniacs enjoyed some human bowling!

The third period saw the Canes coming out flying, however, Neuvirth appeared to have regained his composure after a rough third period. He made a fantastic series of saves early, including a great rebound save on his glove side early on. The Canes tested a few different line combo’s for a few shifts too: We saw Lindholm take a few shifts with Aho and Staal, as well as Stalberg moved to the first line for the first half of the third period. The clutch first line of Skinner-Rask-Stempniak was broken apart as Stalberg and his speed had challenged the Flyers D. The first line changed to Teuvo T.-Rask-Stalberg.

The Flyers took their second penalty of the game with around 12 minutes remaining and it appeared that this would be a great opportunity for the Canes. Another critical turnover led to the Flyers rush and Bellemare found Manning streaking far-side down an uncontested neutral zone and a wide open path to Cam Ward. It looked like the backside D for the Canes got caught watching the turnover from Rask and was over-committed to the near-side boards which left the middle of the ice exposed. Manning scored his second of the year off of a great shot that beat Ward high on the blocker side.

The Canes continued to get some quality scoring chances and had 2 offensive zones in the final 20 seconds to try and light the lamp. Unfortunately, they were unable to get the puck to the net as the clock wound down to zero and the Flyers pulled off a 4-3 win. The Canes and Caniacs were very disappointed to not pull this one out, especially since they outshot the Flyers 12-3 in the final frame. Not surprisingly, the Canes dominated the faceoff circles again as they won 37 of 63 draws (58.7%).

One thing I did notice was that the Canes missed the net a lot tonight, as well as the Flyers blocking a substantial amount of shots with 18. The final shot total was 29-28 for the Hurricanes—however, it couldn’t easily been 40 if they hit the net and maximized their opportunities.

Aho continues to show great skills and hockey senses. He sees the ice very well and finds open guys with excellent passes. The one complaint is that he is struggling to find the net and has been missing some amazing chances recently. He had one chance in third period with a wide open and sprawling Neuvirth and ended up not converting. Young guys like these need to get that first goal so that it gets behind them and doesn’t grow into an elephant in the room scenario that lowers confidence.

Here were some of Coach Peters thoughts on the loss:

Overall 2 critical turnovers and 2 soft goals from Ward were all the Flyers needed to squash the Hurricanes chances of sweeping their opening weekend with consecutive wins. This is part of the growing pains that comes with a young team—there will be games where the compounding mistakes eventually are too much to overcome. The Canes travel to Ottawa on Tuesday and then head to Nashville on Saturday. It will be nice to have the days between Ottawa and Nashville to hopefully work out a few of the situational awareness mistakes that are costing the Canes dearly.

Show Comments
Loading...
Loading...
Loading sidebar...
0
Show comments for this article