Their level of play remains high, but the Flyers still can\u2019t find a way to get it all the way over the top.<\/p>\n
Despite keeping the score close for a third straight game Monday night, the Flyers fell once again, this time by a 4-1 score to the Lightning at Benchmark International Arena in Tampa in a game that featured two Tampa goals in the last three minutes.<\/p>\n
There were some bright spots for the 0-2-2 Flyers, including a good bounce-back effort from goaltender Dan Vladar. Ultimately, the Flyers were outshot by a 36-14 margin, simply not acceptable in the coach\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
Coming off a 7-0 loss to Pittsburgh in last week\u2019s opener, Vladar looked much steadier against a high-powered Lightning offense.<\/p>\n
Down 2-0 in the second period, the Flyers drew close on Tyson Foerster\u2019s goal at 7:22. The play started with a shot by Foerster. The puck went into a scrum of players and got past goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy. Originally credited to Porter Martone, it ultimately went on Foerster\u2019s account.<\/p>\n
The Flyers have been outshot, 158-76, in their first four games. The minus-82 margin is the second-worst in the NHL since the 1959-60 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s not enough compete in this group right now and it\u2019s on me,\u201d coach Rick Tocchet said. \u201cIt starts with me. This team is way too comfortable. And they did not compete today.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vladar kept the Flyers in it, but there\u2019s only so much a goaltender can do.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur game is not at the level that I think it should be,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have to be better.\u201d<\/p>\n
Added Martone: \u201cWe expect a lot more. You can\u2019t be outshot like that. They\u2019re a good team but we\u2019ve got to come to battle. Hockey is a mindset and it\u2019s how you respond. We have the people, we have the skill. It\u2019s just doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vladar was sharp in the first period, but the Flyers still came out of it on the short end of a 1-0 score. The Flyers managed only three shots in the first 20 minutes and surrendered nine.<\/p>\n
The Lightning finally broke through at 16:05. Brayden Point beat Trevor Zegras on a faceoff, drew back to defenseman John Carlson and was set in position to tip home the point shot.<\/p>\n
Just 17 seconds into the second period, the Lightning struck again. This time Tampa broke up ice with an extra man on the rush. Pontus Holmberg found an opening in the defense and beat Vladar from close range.<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u2022 \u2022<\/p>\n
With defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen sidelined by a left hand injury from in Saturday\u2019s game vs. Carolina, both Simon Benoit and David Jiricek were pressed into action. It was the first time the two played in the same game.<\/p>\n
Cam York was moved up to pair with Travis Sanheim and fill the vacancy created by Ristolainen\u2019s absence. York and Sanheim had played together before Ristolainen returned from injury last year.<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u2022 \u2022<\/p>\n
Another game, another zero in the Flyers\u2019 power-play category.<\/p>\n
Tocchet sounds perplexed by this lack of success in a very important area.<\/p>\n
\u201cI looked at the power play last game (vs. Carolina),\u201d Tocchet said at the morning skate. \u201cWe had like four glorious chances and there were four not smart plays. We need to be more consistent, we\u2019d like to have guys bear down when we have it, we have to score. If that doesn\u2019t happen, we can\u2019t all of a sudden panic.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u2022 \u2022<\/p>\n
NOTES: The Flyers return to action on Thursday when they visit the Ottawa Senators. \u2026 Christian Dvorak entered Monday night\u2019s game with five goals in 18 career games against the Lightning. \u2026 The Flyers\u2019 0-2-2 start matches their slowest since they posted the same mark at the beginning of the 2014-15 season. \u2026 Tampa had a goal disallowed at 2:58 of the third period when officials ruled Brandon Hagel interfered with Vladar. \u2026 Martone went off for concussion testing in the third period but returned for the final minute of play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Their level of play remains high, but the Flyers still can\u2019t find a way to get it all…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":679804,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5112],"tags":[1468,5,4,1467,56,5205,43,5095],"class_list":["post-679803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia-flyers","tag-flyers","tag-hockey","tag-nhl","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-flyers","tag-philadelphiaflyers","tag-sports","tag-top-stories-tmc"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/117391947427409449","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679803","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=679803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}