February 27, 2024
The Flyers needed this.
After a hard-fought weekend back-to-back against two divisional rivals that ultimately left them winless, banged up, undermanned, and in a playoff race that suddenly grew tighter, they needed a showing like Tuesday night.
With the experienced Tampa Bay Lightning, who dismantled them in a reality check of a game just over a month ago, visiting the Wells Fargo Center again, the Flyers completely turned the tides, skating right through them and a power outage to a 6-2 win.
Bobby Brink scored in his return to the lineup and the NHL, and Tyson Foerster stayed hot with his fourth goal in three games – a highlight reel one to boot – to open the floodgates to a run of three unanswered.
Tampa coach Jon Cooper pulled his goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy with more than nine minutes left to go, and this one was pretty much as good as Philly's from there.
Again, they needed this.
The Flyers improved to 31-22-7 on the season for a 69 points that will keep them firmly at third in the Metro and six above the Washington Capitals, who are right behind them and on deck Friday night in D.C., but not before getting thrashed by the Red Wings over in Detroit.
Back to Philly though, here are five thoughts from Tuesday night...
With Travis Konecny out and designated as day-to-day with an upper-body injury, the Flyers called Brink back up looking for some offense.
And he gave them some offense.
Just over two minutes in, the bounce of the puck on a Lightning dump in completely died, which allowed Marc Staal to easily pick it up in the corner and then flip it over to Morgan Frost across the middle of the ice. Frost gloved it and set it down with Tampa checkers drifting toward him, which left Brink all alone to his right.
Frost slid him the puck, Brink carried it then cut across over the blueline to shake the defender, then dragged a shot across his body to beat Vasilevskiy under his blocker. 1-0, Flyers and a welcome back to the NHL for Bobby Brink.
WELCOME BACK BOBBY BRINK ‼ 🚨
— NBC Sports Philadelphia (@NBCSPhilly) February 28, 2024
Just like that it's 1-0 Flyers! pic.twitter.com/87Q4RuKrfo
He's still not totally there, Tortorella admitted after the morning skate in Voorhees earlier Tuesday, but with the team shorthanded up front – especially since Cam Atkinson would go on to be scratched from the lineup as well – there was still a way for him to jump back in and help.
"Bobby's brought some offense to us when he was here," Tortorella said. "Leveled out a little bit. I think he needed a mindset change a little bit as young players do sometimes...I'm hoping he can bring us some offense if he plays...
"[We] didn't bring him here to check. Hopefully, he'll bring some offense to us."
So far, so good there.
"I'm just gonna go out there and do my best and play my game," Brink said before the game. "What comes from it comes from it. All you can control is your effort, so that's all I'm gonna do."
Tyson Foerster, man.
SLICK MOVES FROM TYSON FOERSTER 🔥 pic.twitter.com/1mpTMg7Zly
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) February 28, 2024
"He's been an impressive player for us all year long," Tortorella said earlier Tuesday. "Even though he has really fought hard to try and get some consistency scoring, he's done all the other things. We lose a couple games this weekend, but I look at some of the things he's done and I look at some of the other things some of these other kids have done, it kinda wakes you up a little bit to know that some good things are going on here too, especially with him."
And Foerster woke the entire Wells Fargo Center up Tuesday night, pulling off the through-the-legs deke with the finish on the backhand to beat Vasilevskiy.
It was the 22-year old's 14th goal on the year, a major momentum shifter for the Flyers, and the point that opened the floodgates.
The Flyers scored two more unanswered from there and then another two on the empty net after Tampa moved to pull Vasilevskiy to put this one away.
Konecny was out through the weekend and sidelined again Tuesday night with an upper-body injury. He's day-to-day, per the team.
Big defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen, out since February 10's win over Seattle, is week-to-week with his own upper-body injury.
And Jamie Drysdale, who took a hard hit in open ice during Sunday's loss to Pittsburgh and left the game clutching his left shoulder, is also week-to-week – also, unsurprisingly, with an upper-body injury.
Konencny has been a force for the Flyers at both ends of the ice all season and is the team's leading scorer, so the hope is he'll be back sooner rather than later. Drysdale could've been – and did look – a whole lot worse, but maybe he makes it back during this last stretch. Ristolainen? That one's kind of been shrouded in mystery, so who knows?
Regardless, the Flyers are banged up and in need of everyone to step up right now. Against the Rangers, the Lightnings, Bruins, and Panthers of the league and so on – all of which they've faced, have coming up, or coming back around – you need absolutely everything you've got.
"Just that 'next man up' mentality," defenseman Cam York, who potted the Flyers' sixth goal on a Hail Mary thrown across the rink and toward the empty Tampa net late, said earlier Tuesday. "We've had it before in the past with past injuries so just another scenario of that. This time of the year these are important games and we have to win. Guys have to step up and I'm confident that guys will do that."
A few hours later, they did.
Just past the six-minute mark in the first period, the lights in the Wells Fargo Center went out. The sound system and the scoreboard went with them too, and a delay followed.
Enough light was still focused on the ice though, so after a few minutes of the refs going back and forth between the benches, play resumed.
And what was on the ice, that was normal, that was NHL hockey. But everything surrounding it during that decent stretch into the second period? That was an experience. There were no theatrics at all. No music, no video, no horn, no visible clock, not even Lou Nolan over the PA speaker. There was only the sound of the crowd, sticks tapping, skates carving, and the puck and bodies crashing off the boards until a whistle gave pause.
It was surreal, and the crowd bought in, especially for Mites on Ice during the intermission, as they gave those kids the loudest roar of the night to that point.
"That was weird," Frost said postgame. "But I think everyone was still down to play with the way it was. I think it was more asking the goalies if they were cool with it, and yeah, ended up playing."
"It was super dead in there, we felt like on the bench," Foerster said. "Not the fans. The fans were great, but just like, no music or anything, it was kinda weird."
What the hell just happened😂😂😂😂 #TBLvsPHI #LetsGoFlyers pic.twitter.com/d818POegcU
— Flyers Clips (@Flyers_Clips) February 28, 2024
Eventually, the lights came back on. So did the sound, and when Nolan was able to get back on the mic again, the crowd cheered and everything was back to the usual in-game flair.
Except for the scoreboard overtop. That stayed out of commission.
Here's the Twitter/X thread as it was all happening:
Lights and sound came back. Lou Nolan spoked over the PA. Crowd cheered.
— Nick Tricome (@itssnick) February 28, 2024
Clock still jammed at 13:43. Scoreboard still out. Getting there though. pic.twitter.com/sRgaCQxujv
This was the Flyers' starting lineup Tuesday night:
Tonight's starting lineup features...#TBLvsPHI | @SNICKERS pic.twitter.com/gWF6mn9TPZ
— Philadelphia Flyers (@NHLFlyers) February 27, 2024
A bold play for a banged-up team in need of a charge, but a gamble in a scenario where there wasn't a whole lot of room to miss going in.
Tortorella's logic from the morning skate earlier in the day:
"Four lines go and then I make my call during the game," Tortorella said. "The way our team is right now I think our best line is Poehls' line, but they can't check and score the goals. They can't do it all. They're trying. We need to get more out of people. That's where we're at right now, and especially now at this time of year. I'm gonna move things around. If I think guys are going and they're gonna help us win that particular game, that's where we're going because we need those particular points before worrying about anything else."
The result: Poehling's line stayed flying, Frost's line hit on a sequence that led to Brink scoring right away, Foerster stayed hot, Travis Sanheim and Sean Walker got in on the scoring, and the Flyers left with an effort that finally put them back in the win column.
It paid off.
The Flyers did have to tread carefully when it came to matchups though. On a shift still early into the first, the Couturier fourth line and the bottom defensive pairing of Marc Staal and Egor Zamula got caught out there against Tampa's top dogs in Brandon Hagel, Brayden Point, and Nikita Kucherov. The Lightning held the puck in the Philadelphia zone nearly the entire time.
Still, they managed. And hey, however you can swing the points.
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