PHILADELPHIA \u2014 The crowd was already jacked up to shower ex-Flyer Cutter Gauthier with boos and get the Flyers fired up.<\/p>\n
But then Anaheim\u2019s Ross Johnston laid a blind-side hit on Flyers defenseman Jamie Drysdale early in the second period, and the anger index at Xfinity Mobile Arena skyrocketed.<\/p>\n
Credit the Flyers with not getting too caught up in exacting revenge.<\/p>\n
They stuck to business and used a pair of Trevor Zegras goals, plus another strong Dan Vladar performance to send the Ducks packing Tuesday night, 5-2.<\/p>\n
Zegras, who joined the Flyers last summer via trade from the Ducks, suggested it was fun to stick it to his old team.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, it was cool,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been thinking about this game for a long time. It was one that meant a lot to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
The emotional sellout crowd added to the overall vibe. There were plenty of cheers for Zegras and R-rated chances for Gauthier, a former Flyer first-round pick who refused to sign here, dealt in Jan. 2024 for Drysdale.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was awesome,\u201d Zegras said. \u201cThey\u2019re great. A tough back-to-back for them, but they\u2019ve got a lot of great players.\u201d<\/p>\n
Zegras has never had a hat trick and he admitted he was thinking about it, given the setting.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlaying your old team, getting that third one would have been pretty cool,\u201d Zegras said. \u201cBut we got the win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Defenseman Cam York, who has been friends with Zegras since being teammates in the U.S. National Team Development Program in 2017-18, understood what it meant to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe knew it was a big game,\u201d York said. \u201cFor everybody, but especially for him. It\u2019s super-nice to get the win there. For him to get two goals is pretty special.\u201d<\/p>\n
Zegras had already set a career-high for goals, now at 17. The second half of the season should put that old mark far back in the rearview mirror.<\/p>\n
Coach Rick Tocchet was even-keeled after the game. He seldom gets too high or too low with his post-game comments.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwo great shots,\u201d Tocchet said of Zegras.<\/p>\n
Was this almost a playoff-like atmosphere?<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought that was an outstanding crowd,\u201d Tocchet said. \u201cThat was a loud building. They were awesome. I think they really gave our team some juice. Even when Anaheim scored the first goal, they (the crowd) didn\u2019t let up. They really helped us tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n
Both Zegras goals came on the power play in the first period, for the NHL\u2019s 31st-ranked power play.<\/p>\n
Zegras is developing a knack for scoring from the lower right circle when the Flyers are on the man advantage. The sharpshooter sets up shop on his off wing, then waits for a point man to draw the checker away.<\/p>\n
The first goal came at 10:22 to tie the score after Gauthier connected on a Ducks power play. Zegras beat Lukas Dostal short side.<\/p>\n
It was more of the same at 14:23. The Ducks couldn\u2019t shift over in time and Zegras hit the back of the net again.<\/p>\n
In the second period, York\u2019s point shot found its way through a maze of bodies at 1:15. Then his partner, Travis Sanheim scored shortly after Noah Cates won a faceoff, connecting at 14:40.<\/p>\n
Anaheim got one back on a power play early in the third, but that\u2019s as close as the Ducks would get.<\/p>\n
Zegras linemate Christian Dvorak did not get caught offguard by Zegras\u2019 performance. He sensed it would be that kind of night.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou knew he was going to be up for this game,\u201d Dvorak said. \u201cWe definitely wanted to get him one tonight. It (the first goal) was a big boost. The crowd was into it all game. That certainly helped to get on the board early and tie it up. The fans were just electric all night.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u2022 \u2022<\/p>\n
Drysdale was injured in the collision with Johnston and lay motionless on the ice for several minutes. A stretcher was rolled out. But Drysdale, who did not appear to get struck in the head by Johnston\u2019s shoulder, eventually stood up and made it to the locker room under his own power.<\/p>\n
Johnston received a five-minute interference and a game misconduct. Drysdale was done for the night.<\/p>\n
Bobby Brink suffered an upper-body injury in the second period and did not return to action. Tocchet had no update post-game.<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u2022 \u2022<\/p>\n
NOTES >> Matvei Michkov was scratched due to a foot injury suffered Saturday in Edmonton. X-rays were negative. Nikita Grebenkin returned to the lineup in his place, scoring an empty-netter. \u2026 Toronto is up next for the Flyers Thursday night. Coach Craig Berube, the former Flyers coach, brings in a Leafs team that is struggling. Toronto entered Tuesday seventh in the Atlantic Division with a road record of 5-10-2. \u2026 It was Ed Snider \u201cA Flyer Forever\u201d Legacy Night at Xfinity Mobile Arena. The founder of the Flyers would have turned 93 Tuesday. There were video clips and still photographs of Snider shown throughout the game. Snider died in April 2016. \u2026 York entered ranked fifth in plus-minus among NHL defensemen since Dec. 20 with a plus-8.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHILADELPHIA \u2014 The crowd was already jacked up to shower ex-Flyer Cutter Gauthier with boos and get the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395007,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5112],"tags":[1468,5,4,1467,56,5205,43,5095],"class_list":{"0":"post-395006","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-flyers","8":"tag-flyers","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-philadelphia","12":"tag-philadelphia-flyers","13":"tag-philadelphiaflyers","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-top-stories-tmc"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115852326148332545","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395006\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}