10 things: Carter Hart, Flyers defense step up in big rematch win vs. Panthers

SUNRISE, Fla. — The Philadelphia Flyers sure seem to be getting the hang of these “response games.”

In the wake of Tuesday’s crushing loss to the New York Islanders — which saw the Flyers come all the way back from a 3-0 deficit to tie the score, only to watch overtime and a potential win slip through their fingers seconds later — they faced the tough task of immediately shaking off the defeat. Next up was a rematch with the playoff-contending Florida Panthers, whom they’d faced Monday at home.

Just like Monday, they cruised to victory.

The Flyers never trailed Thursday night, jumping out to a 3-0 lead by the end of the first period en route to a 6-2 win. Florida briefly made the game interesting early in the third period, cutting Philadelphia’s edge to 4-2, but a late Sean Couturier breakaway ensured the team would head to Tampa for a battle with the powerhouse Lightning with a victory in its pocket.

1. Hart comes through on the road

Let’s get this out of the way: Carter Hart hasn’t performed well this season away from Philadelphia.

The phenomenon never made much sense — Hart was fine on the road during his rookie year, and his preternatural calm would seem to run counter to the idea that he’d allow being away from home to dramatically impact his play. But acknowledging his 2019-20 road struggles were likely a fluke didn’t change the ugliness of the numbers: an 0.850 save percentage and just two wins, both coming in shootouts.

Even the most rational observers may have allowed a doubting thought to creep into their heads: What if Hart is just bad on the road?

The 21-year-old’s performance on Thursday serves as strong evidence he isn’t.

“There’s no difference from playing at home than playing on the road,” Hart said after making 26 saves on 28 shots to earn the win. “It’s the same puck, it’s the same ice surface, it’s the same boards, it’s all the same. So you’ve just got to prepare the same, no matter where you’re at, and whether you’re at home or on the road.”

The score implies Hart’s play wasn’t essential to the victory, but don’t be fooled. Hart may have received ample goal support, and he didn’t face a deluge of chances, but at two key moments, he came through with monster stops.

If the Panthers score in either of these situations — a short-handed tally to take a 1-0 lead just minutes into the first period, and one that would have cut Philadelphia’s lead to one goal and turned Florida’s early third-period surge into a true comeback wave — the entire complexion of the game changes. Does that mean the Flyers would have lost had Hart not made these stops? Of course not. But having to play from behind and being forced to protect a one-goal lead for 14 minutes are tough asks of any team, particularly in a matchup with playoff implications.

Instead, Hart kept the drama to a minimum.

“I’m just trying to keep the puck out of the net, no matter what time of the game (it is),” he said. “Whether it’s 4-0, 4-2, whatever the score, I’m just trying to keep the puck out of the net.”

Those don’t sound like a player worried about his ability to perform on the road.

2. Flyers far better defensively than on Monday

Philadelphia came away from Monday’s Round 1 against the Panthers with a comfortable win, but head coach Alain Vigneault didn’t have all positive feelings about how the Flyers played. Specifically, he had major issues with their defensive work.

“They had some real good looks tonight,” Vigneault said Monday. “Carter made some big saves, and on a couple of occasions, we were fortunate that they did not execute.”

Vigneault made it clear to his team that another run-and-gun, trade-chances type of game would not be acceptable in the rematch, nor would it likely result in a second victory. Particularly over the first 40 minutes Thursday, the Flyers responded perfectly.

Florida had its share of puck possession, but it had to fight for every inch. Not only did the Flyers make it far tougher for the Panthers to move through the neutral zone with speed, but they also turned the Florida offense into four corners, almost completely keeping it out of the slot area while holding the Panthers largely to perimeter shots.

Check this out. Everything is coming from the low slot and netfront area for the Flyers, while they're forcing the Panthers to essentially run a four corners offense.

via @NatStatTrick pic.twitter.com/3akxhMGAoZ

— Charlie O'Connor (@charlieo_conn) February 14, 2020

So what changed this time? There were multiple interpretations.

Couturier: “I think we were just well structured. We were chipping pucks in, getting some good forecheck, being on the right side of pucks and creating turnovers.”

James van Riemsdyk: “We just were really deliberate with when we had the puck, and what we wanted to do with it.”

Matt Niskanen: “(We had) solid structure in the neutral zone, where we caused a lot of turnovers. And we had a really good chip-and-chase, chip-and-support type game, where they were trying to be aggressive and we just kept advancing it, and we’re off to the races a few times.”

Essentially, the Flyers played “their game” — a dump-in heavy, north/south attack centered on speed and the avoidance of low-percentage plays with the puck. Combine that with an emphasis on not permitting transition rushes, and it led to a stifling defensive effort — at least through two periods.

3. Odd-man rushes cut down dramatically

How successful were the Flyers at limiting Florida’s opportunities to attack with speed? Through two periods, they allowed just two odd-man rushes — and that’s only if you count breakaways as odd-man rushes. Aside from Frank Vatrano’s two breakaway opportunities, Philadelphia made sure the Panthers never had the numbers advantage on the rush over the first 40 minutes.

The commitment to rush prevention didn’t stop the Flyers from attacking the Panthers with numbers, however. I recorded eight Flyers odd-man rushes (including breakaways) during that span.

Monday was chock-full of odd-man rushes for both teams. On Thursday, one club cleaned up its defensive play enough to remove that weapon from its opponent’s arsenal. The other club continued to fall victim to its bad habits. It should come as little surprise that the former team came away victorious.

4. What happened in the third period?

After sheer domination through two periods — the Flyers generated 67.97 percent of the expected goals per Natural Stat Trick’s model — the script flipped entirely in the third. Suddenly, Florida was getting to loose pucks first, winning puck battles, (finally) creating scoring chances and turning them into goals. Had Hart not made a monster stop on Evgenii Dadonov to keep the score 4-2, perhaps this game becomes one of the more devastating losses of the season.

Team leaders Niskanen and Couturier said that while the Flyers’ sharpness did dip to start the third period, the Panthers’ surge was more a product of what they were doing well.

“It went off the rails a little bit there for us,” Niskanen acknowledged. “It was mostly them, I think they just came with max pressure.”

“We weren’t as sharp mentally,” Couturier said. “We were in the right place, but giving up some odd-man rushes and letting guys fly by us. They’re a good team, they have a lot of skill, and they can capitalize.”

To the Flyers’ credit, they stabilized things shortly after Hart’s big stop on Dadonov, and with five minutes left, Couturier clinched the win with a breakaway tally. Perhaps a team with the top-end talent Florida possesses was always going to make a push. But the start of the third period prevented the Flyers from being able to say they essentially played a perfect road game.

5. No timeout works for Vigneault, Flyers

When Aleksander Barkov scored at the 15:04 mark of the third period to cut Philadelphia’s lead to two goals, it was fair to wonder how Vigneault might react to the possibility of a key game slipping out of his team’s grasp. Would he choose to call a timeout in an attempt to settle down the players?

Vigneault received scattered criticism during the post-Christmas road trip for hesitating to use a timeout in an attempt to regain momentum. He later acknowledged that he prefers to save timeouts because he feels he can usually get his message across immediately after a goal is scored, or thinks an extended TV timeout is about to be called.

This time, Vigneault’s bet that his team didn’t need a timeout to get its bearings proved correct. While the Flyers required the big Hart save before finding their footing, they settled down after Barkov’s goal. Asked after the game why he believed the Flyers would rebound without a timeout, Vigneault explained that he expected a Florida surge, and he believed his team wasn’t playing poorly enough to require a full reset.

“I figured, with that skill level, (the Panthers) would have a strong push, and they did,” Vigneault said. “We made a mistake on the first goal, they got a bounce on the second goal, so as players and a team, you’ve just got to play. And that’s what we did — we kept playing, kept making, I thought, better plays from that moment on, and obviously they would be pressing, and they pressed a little bit. Coots caught them there and he was able to score that big goal.”

The TV timeout likely was a factor as well — an extended stoppage at the 13:55 mark, a little over a minute after Barkov’s goal. Still, it came immediately after Hart’s stop on Dadonov, meaning that if Vigneault’s goalie doesn’t come up with that save, perhaps the same critics who railed against his conservative timeout philosophy would be doing so again today. It speaks to the thin line between a decision being criticized versus praised or forgotten.

6. Sanheim injury a concern

The Flyers exited the night with only a few negatives — the less-than-stellar start to the third period, Columbus losing in overtime rather than regulation (and therefore, nabbing a standings point). But those were minor. A Travis Sanheim injury, on the other hand, could prove devastating to the Flyers’ push to secure a playoff spot.

The injury appeared to occur midway through the second period, during Florida’s only power play, in a collision with Barkov. The awkward fall seemed to catch Sanheim off guard, and although he stayed on the ice for the remainder of his shift, he was clearly hampered as a result.

One good sign for the Flyers is that the lower-body injury didn’t immediately knock Sanheim out of the game — he took four more shifts, including one early in the third period. But he sat out the bulk of the third, though he remained on the bench. Asked for an update on Sanheim’s status afterward, Vigneault was mum.

“I don’t have one,” Vigneault said. “I know, in the second period, he suffered a lower body injury and tried (to play) at the beginning of the third, and I haven’t talked to our medical (staff yet).”

Sanheim didn’t look hampered when he walked out of the locker room after the win. But that doesn’t mean he avoided a serious injury. We’ll learn more at Friday afternoon’s practice in Tampa.

7. Flyers take full advantage of depth edge

Perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise that the Flyers exploited this advantage. After all, the Panthers lack forward depth; they dressed two defensemen (Mark Pysyk and Mike Matheson) as forwards on Thursday. Their top-end talent is fine — every club wishes it had players like Barkov, Dadonov and Jonathan Huberdeau — but after Line 2, there’s a steep drop-off.

The Flyers, on the other hand, have slowly rebuilt their depth. Connor Bunnaman and Nicolas Aubé-Kubel suddenly look like above-average NHL bottom-sixers. Van Riemsdyk is scoring again. Michael Raffl is showing his value in a fourth-line role. Scott Laughton and Tyler Pitlick have become fan-favorites due to their high-effort styles, and have impressive statistical resumes to match.

“Ultimately, we have a lot of good players on our team,” van Riemsdyk said. “When you have that, you’re going to create some matchup problems somewhere.”

Against Florida, the bottom six was clearly where the biggest talent gap existed between the two teams.

8. JvR does his best to make up for Tuesday error

After Tuesday’s loss to the Islanders, many fans blamed van Riemsdyk for Ryan Pulock’s late game-winning goal. Van Riemsdyk, the thinking went, should have found a way to disrupt the shot from the point, preventing it from getting through to Brian Elliott in the first place.

As van Riemsdyk acknowledged after Thursday’s victory, he didn’t disagree.

“Obviously, me personally, being out there for the last goal against the last game, I want to try to get a piece of that one and unfortunately, it cost us the game,” he said. “And that’s when you have a couple of sleepless nights before the next one.”

Fortunately for the Flyers, JvR took out his frustration on the Panthers. His goal kicked off the scoring Thursday, and he added two more assists. His second helper was truly impressive: a creative, below-the-red-line feed to a wide-open Laughton.

The “mistake” in Brooklyn was painful. But van Riemsdyk now has seven points in his last four games, and three of those points are goals. From an offensive standpoint, van Riemsdyk looks like he’s finally heating up, just as the games are increasing in importance.

9. Pitlick the sniper continues to impress

This season, Pitlick has been a lot of things for the Flyers. Low-key one of their better defensive forwards? Yes. (He entered the night near the top of Philadelphia’s advanced stat leaderboards in impact on expected goal prevention.) A relentless forechecker? Of course. Capable of chipping in with some offense here and there? No doubt.

But a sniper, capable of fooling all-world netminder Sergei Bobrovsky from a sharp angle? That’s a new one.

Pitlick has come a long way since being viewed by some as “the player at the end of the Wayne Simmonds trade tree.” It also feels like a lifetime ago when Pitlick struggled to start the season, largely because he barely had a training camp due to September wrist surgery. He’s ended up being exactly what general Chuck Fletcher and the Flyers hoped he would be when they swapped Ryan Hartman for him in June: an ideal role player in a bottom six.

10. Columbus games remain pivotal

By sweeping the Panthers this week, the Flyers put serious distance between them and Florida in the standings. In a 10-team race for eight Eastern Conference playoff spots, they now hold a five-point edge over Florida with 24 games remaining. The Panthers could erase that gap, but they have no more games against the Flyers to aid their chase. If the Flyers continue to win more games than they lose — and assuming the Panthers don’t embark on a big winning streak — they should be able to keep Florida in their rearview.

But even if that’s how it plays out, it still leaves nine teams battling for eight spots. Philadelphia will have to outplay one of the contending Metropolitan Division teams to lock down its spot. Six Metro clubs are in the race, and a maximum of five can make the postseason. That means that the Flyers have to finish ahead of one of Washington (little chance), Pittsburgh (highly unlikely), the Islanders, the Hurricanes or the Blue Jackets.

Next week’s back-to-back against Columbus looms as a golden opportunity to surpass a direct competitor for a spot. The injury-ravaged Blue Jackets (Seth Jones and Cam Atkinson are both out for weeks) have lost three straight games. While they will likely return to their winning ways by the time they face the Flyers (Columbus plays the Rangers and Devils next), this is a very beatable team in its current form.

The Flyers are tied with the Blue Jackets in the standings, but trail them due to the tiebreaker. A sweep of Columbus next week would firmly establish the Flyers as the No. 4 team in the Metro, ahead of the Blue Jackets and the Hurricanes. That wouldn’t lock down a playoff spot, but it would put Philadelphia in an enviable spot heading into the stretch run.

All statistics courtesy of Evolving Hockey and Natural Stat Trick.

Archives: O’Connor’s Observations and 10 Things

(Photo: Lynne Sladky / AP)