5 THINGS: Flyers @ Maple Leafs

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This is the third and final meeting of the season between the teams and the lone game in Toronto. The Flyers were shut out, 3-0, at the Wells Fargo Center on Nov. 10 and lost again, 6-3, on April 2.
The Flyers have lost five straight games, all in regulation.The team is coming off getting swept in a weekend home-and-home set with the Buffalo Sabres, 4-3 on Saturday in Buffalo and 5-3 the next night at the Wells Fargo Center.
The Maple Leafs, who are 8-1-1 over their last 10 games, have won three in a row. They are coming off a 5-4 overtime road win in Ottawa on Saturday and a 4-2 home win against the New York Islanders on Sunday.
Here are five things to watch in this game:
1. Avoid Toronto's fearsome power play.
In the weekend home-and-home set against Buffalo, the Flyers were torched by the Sabres' power play. Of their six opportunities on the man advantage over the two games, the Sabres converted four into goals. They repeatedly completed cross-seam passes and scored from the flanks. The 4-for-6 did not include an additional goal scored during a delayed Flyers' penalty with Buffalo skating 6-on-5.
Heading to Toronto, the Flyers will be up against the NHL's No. 1 ranked power play. The Maple Leafs enter this game with a 27.8 percent success rate (59-for-219) including a phenomenal 30.9 percent (34-for-110) success rate on home ice.
After the weekend debacle against the Sabres, the Flyers' penalty kill fell to 75.1 percent on the season (opposing power plays are 53-for-212). The team is ranked 27th in the 32-team NHL.
The last time the Flyers played the Maple Leafs, Toronto was held to a single power play (which Philadelphia killed successfully). That would be a good start for the Flyers in this game: stay out of the penalty box as much as possible.
On the power play, the Flyers will enter this game ranked last in the NHL at 12.3 percent (27-for-219) for the season. Over the 31 games the Flyers have played since the All-Star break, they are 8-for-92 (8.7 percent). Dating it back to Jan. 1, the team is 9.9 percent (13-for-131) on the power play over the 45 games they've played to date in the 2022 calendar year.
Compounding the issues in scoring on the power play and keeping the puck out of the net on the penalty kill, the Flyers have been plagued by opposing shorthanded goals. The Flyers rank 30th with 11 shorthanded goals allowed. Toronto tops the NHL with 13 shorthanded goals scored, led by four from Ilya Mikheyev and three by Mitchell Marner.Toronto's penalty kill ranks 7th in the NHL at 82.9 percent for the season.
At 5-on-5, the Flyers are minus-30 for the season (149 GF - 179GA) and minus-12 since the All-Star break 71 GF - 83 GA). The Maple Leafs are plus-27 overall (198 GF - 171 GA) for the season and plus-eight (95 GF - 87 GA) since the All-Star break.
2. More Scoring Sources Needed
Over the 22 games he's played since returning to the Flyers' lineup on March 5, center Kevin Hayes leads the team with 20 points (6g, 14a). He had a goal and an assist on Sunday against the Sabres.
In the meantime, Scott Laughton and Morgan Frost have posted just five points apiece (1g, 4a each) in that same span. Laughton has posted just one point (0g, 1a) in seven games played since returning from a concussion suffered in the March 10 game at Florida.
Frost has four points in his last 11 games (1g, 3a). There have been several games -- including the last one against Toronto, where he was robbed by a diving save made by Jack Campbell, and a 10-bell overtime stop by New York's Igor Sheshterkin the next night -- in which Frost has either created scoring chances for linemates or had prime scoring chances of his own. He's also continued to work hard on his 200-foot game. The bottom line, however, is that the Flyers need more than just additional point opportunities: they need more points from a player drafted primarily for his offensive skill set.
No Flyers player has posted more than 50 points this season. Leading scorer Cam Atkinson (23g, 27a) has missed the last three games due to a lower-body injury. He skated on Saturday but felt discomfort. As of Sunday, Yeo was uncertain whether Atkinson would make the trip to Toronto and Montreal. Even before Atkinson went down in the first period of the Washington game, he was dealing with nagging injuries and the wear-down effect of the season. He was pointless in his last seven games and goalless in 12 (three assists).
Joel Farabee potted a goal in the first period of Saturday's game in Buffalo and did newcomer Owen Tippett. Farabee has two points (2g, 0a) over his last nine games and, uncharacteristically, is a traditional minus-12 in that span.
Tippett has not lacked for scoring chances or willingness to shoot (35 shots on goal) in the 16 games he's played since coming over from Florida in the Claude Giroux trade. However, he has a modest four points (3g, 1a) to show for it so far.
Travis Konecny had a spate of scoring chances over the two weekend games against Buffalo, and scored a nice goal under the crossbar to the short side as he took the puck to the net in Saturday's game. He's the team's leading scorer since the All-Star break (six goals, 16a, 22 points in 30 games). Over the last 10 games, he's posted four points (2g, 2a).
James van Riemsdyk's two-goal game against Washington -- giving his 20 on the season among his 33 points -- was one of the few bright spots in the team's blowout loss. However, those were his only points in his last six games and JVR has three points (3g, 0a) to show for the 10 games he's played since a mid-to-late March surge in which he posted at least one point in seven of eight games (4g, 4a).
Since turning professional, Noah Cates has chipped in three goals and five points in 10 games. Bobby Brink has two assists in his four games played to date since winning the NCAA national championship with the University of Denver Pioneers. Defenseman Ronnie Attard has two points (1g, 1a) in nine games since turning pro.
3. Inside the Numbers: Finishing the Job
Prior to Sunday's game against Buffalo, Five Things took a look at the Flyers' second-period woes (an issue that continued into the return match against the Sabres, as the Flyers went into the second period down 2-1 and exited with a 4-2 deficit). This time, we'll discuss the Flyers issues in finding ways to win close games in the third period. In roughly half of the games played this season, the Flyers have either been tied or down by no more than one goal within the third period. Only 11 of these games have ended in the win column.
Entering the weekend, the Flyers and Sabres were the only two NHL teams not to win a single game this season in which they trailed by two goals at some point. The Sabres got off the schneid -- at the Flyers' expense -- on Saturday as Philly took a 2-0 edge to the second period until to collapse in a disastrous middle frame on the way to a 4-3 loss. Now the Flyers are the lone NHL team to be winless for the season under such a circumstance. On Sunday, the Flyers scored first (ultimately dropping to 18-9-7) but trailed by two goals entering the third period. Philly got back within a goal but their comeback hopes were dashed by yielding their 21st empty net goal of the season. When trailing by any score after two periods, the Flyers are 2-32-4.
Meanwhile, when giving up the first goal of a game, the Flyers are 5-33-4. The Maple Leafs are 33-6-2 when scoring first and 17-14-4 when trailing first.

4. Behind Enemy Lines: Toronto Maple Leafs
In each of the two previous meetings this season, the Flyers did a good job of not only containing Toronto in the first period but in taking the play to them. Inevitably, though, Toronto made a push in the second and/or third periods and the Flyers were unable to handle it. Last time around, a sequence where the Flyers futilely chased Marner around in their zone led to an Auston Matthews goal. From there, Toronto dominated the rest of the way.
Matthews enters this game ranked fifth in the Art Ross Trophy race with 102 points (eight points behind Connor McDavid) and leading the Rocket Richard Trophy race with 58 goals (four more than Leon Draisaitl). Marner is six points away from a 100-point season and is eighth in the assist race with 60 helpers to go along with his 34 goals.
Twenty-six-year-old Michael Bunting is second among NHL rookies with 63 points and his 23 goals trail only Nashville's Tanner Jeannot for the top spot among NHL rookies. Bunting's traditional plus-30 rating leads all NHL rookies. He's racked up six points in the last three games (3g, 3a) and leads the Maple Leafs with seven points overall across the last five matches.
Toronto's high-powered offense already has a half-dozen players with 60 or more points and could finish the season with four to six players who post 70 points or more. William Nylander (31g, 43a) and John Tavares (26g, 48a) are already at 74 points apiece and the 70-point mark is within reach for defenseman Morgan Rielly (10g, 55a) and Bunting. Reilly's 65 points rank sixth on the NHL defensemen leaderboard and his 55 assists are tied with Pittsburgh's Kris Letang for fourth in that category.
If the Leafs have had one concern about their preparations for the playoffs -- a first-round class with two-time defending Stanley Cup champion Tampa Bay is all but a lock -- it's been the team's goaltending. Cambell's overall season numbers (29-9-5, 2.71 GAA, .912 save percentage, four shutouts) are decent. He stopped 27 of 29 shots in defeating the Islanders. However, Campbell's all-around performance over the last six-plus weeks has been pedestrian (6-1-1 in seven starts and a relief appearance but a 3.51 GAA and .883 save percentage in that span.
In the same time period, Erik Källgren has made nine starts and two relief appearances, posting a 6-3-1 record, 3.02 GAA, .895 save percentage and one shutout. Former Flyers goalie Petr Mrazek, who was waived and cleared in late March, has made seven appearances in that span, going 3-2-0 with a 3.90 GAA and .876 save percentage dating back to March 1.
5. Players to Watch: Sanheim and Giordano
The play of Flyers' defenseman Travis Sanheim has been one of the few bright spots for the team over the last four months. Dating back to the first game after the dismissal of Alain Vigneault as head coach and the promotion of Yeo from assistant coach to interim head coach, Sanheim is third on the Flyers in scoring with 28 points (seven goals, 21 assists) despite only recently getting a significant opportunity at power play time. His traditional plus-seven rating in that span leads the team. Over that time period, Sanheim's regular defense partner, Rasmus Ristolainen (+1) and Justin Braun (+5, traded at the deadline to the New York Rangers) are on the positive side of that particular ledger. Ristolainen will miss Tuesday's game with an upper-body injury; the fourth in a row that he'll be out.
Acquired from the Seattle Kraken at the NHL deadline, Mark Giodano has played 14 games thus far for Toronto. He's chipped in nine points (2g, 7a) while averaging 19:26 of ice time. The former Calgary Flames and Seattle captain is paired at five-on-five with Ilya Lyubushkin (174 credited hits.17:28 TOI).