by Mike del Tufo
Saturday January 18, 2014 In this night game, the Philadelphia Flyers had another impressive 3rd period come-back defeating the New York Islanders 6-4 in the 1st half of a home-and-home series.
For this game, Kevin Poulin started in net for the Islanders and Steve Mason for the Flyers.
Flyers forward combinations:
Giroux-Voracek-Raffl
Hartnell-Simmonds-B.Schenn
Lecavalier-Couturier-Read
Hall-Rosehill-Downie
Flyers defensemen pairings:
Grossmann-Streit
Timonen-Coburn
L.Schenn-Meszaros
Isles dominated early on and started the scoring at 7:43 when John Tavares notched his 22nd goal of the season. Tavares was left all alone by the net and he easily converted a pass from Thomas Vanek. Then at 11:54 Cal Clutterbuck scored short-handed to put the Isles up 2-0. The Flyers came roaring back before the end of the period thanks to defenseman Andrej Meszaros. He continued his strong play as of late scoring at 14:43 and 18:38 to tie the game.
Adam Hall gave the Flyers their first lead of the game at 1:45 of 2nd period. Isles re-tied it at 11:05 when Brock Nelson tipped a shot that evaded Mason. Brian Strait then scored at 14:00 to put the Isles up 4-3 and chase Mason. Ray Emery came in for him. The move gave the team a nice jolt.
The Flyers came out strong in the 3rd period with winger Jakub Voracek blasting in the tying goal at 7:14. Michael Raffl then gave the Flyers a 5-4 lead when he put in a rebound at 15:45. Matt Read ended the scoring with an empty-net goal at 19:04. It was a particularly strong period for the Flyers.
This marked the ninth time this season the Flyers won a game when trailing at some point in the third period.
Voracek on the win said, “We were pretty bad defensively again the first two periods. The third period I think we played a very good offensive game. We got on their defense, we got very good on the forecheck, and we came back, but it can’t happen every game like that. It takes a lot of energy and a little bit of luck to come back like that against good teams like the Islanders are.”
The Flyers’ next game is Monday in New York against the Islanders.
Andrej Meszaros scored the Flyers’ 1st two goals | Source: Andrew King
