post-1.24

The Philadelphia Flyers lost to the New York Islanders, 3-1, at UBS Arena on Friday evening. John Tortorella's team has sustained back-to-back regulation defeats after going 5-0-1.

Most of the first period was tight-checking and physical. Ultimately, the Flyers took a 2-1 deficit to intermission.

Noah Cates attempted a wraparound at 1:20. Two shifts later, Cam York attempted a similar play. At 6:30, Travis Konecny took exception to a hit on York by Alexander Romanov and was called for a roughing minor. The Flyers killed off the penalty without allowing a shot on goal. York had to leave the game.

A stretch of 7:46 with no stoppages of play ended as the Flyers grabbed a 1-0 lead at 14:14 on a 2-on-1 transition rush. Puck carrier Tyson Foerster (13th goal of the season) elected to shoot and found the net between Ilya Sorokin's pad and blocker. The assists went to Konecny and Johnson.

The Flyers seemed poised to carry a very strong first period to intermission. That is, before they yielded goals at 17:08 and 18:03 as a 1-0 lead quickly turned into a 2-1 deficit.

On the first goal, Anthony Duclair (4th goal of the season) got open in the right slot off the rush to take a feed from Brock Nelson and score past Ivan Fedotov. The second assist went to Kyle Palmieri.

Fifty-five seconds later, the Flyers got caught on an ill-timed line change attempt that led directly to a Bo Horvat goal (17th). Mathew Barzal and Romanov drew the assists.

Subsequently, Johnson created a scoring chance for Morgan Frost. Sorokin made the save. First period shots on goal were 7-6 Flyers. In a physical frame, Philly was credited with 13 hits to 10 for New York, The Islanders won 11 of 15 faceoffs.

York returned for the start of the second period. At 8:26, Matvei Michkov stepped off the bench on a line change and received a stretch pass from Frost for a partial breakaway. Pressured from behind, Michkov wasn't able to get off the kind of shot he wanted.

The Flyers' fourth line generated a pair of good looks -- Rodrigo Abols for Garnet Hathaway and then Hathaway for Abols . The score remained 2-1 Islanders.

Foerster made a pair of strong backchecking plays to end threats for the Islanders. After the second, the Flyers went to a power play at 10:14 on a Brock Nelson slashing minor across Foerster's hand. Neither revised power play unit generated much pressure.

The Flyers coughed up another goal at 13:56 as Nelson (14th) scored on a transition rush that started from behind the New York net. Nelson's wrister was a very good shot but the chance from some distance did not look unstoppable for Fedotov at first blush. The entry for the Islanders coming through the neutral zone was also a bit too easy. The assists went to defensemen Adam Pelech and Ryan Pulock.

Second period shots on goal were 14-7 Islanders (20-14 New York overall), with most of the discrepancy coming over the latter half of the period. Through two periods, the Flyers had more shot attempts blocked (15) than ones that got to the net, plus they missed the net on 10 attempts.

Head coach John Tortorella put the line combinations in a blender during the third period. The Flyers had the puck for most of the period with New York primarily focused on taking away the middle of the ice. With 15:43 on the clock, RIchard took a feed from Frost and snapped a shot on net from the slot.

Rasmus Ristolainen was called for interference on Barzal at 7:13. The Islanders had a late scoring chance. With play back at 5-on-5 two shifts later, Michkov had a look from the slot off a Couturier setup. Sorokin made his 23rd save of the game.

The Flyers pulled Fedotov for a 6-on-4 attack with 3:09 left to play. No further scoring ensued. Third period shots were 15-8 in the Flyers favor.

Fedotov played reasonably well, but a save on Nelson's goal would have loomed large. He stopped 24 of 27 shots. Sorokin denied 28 of 29 shots. Arguably, his most important save was the breakaway chance for Michkov when the score was 2-1 Islanders in the second period.

Egor Zamula was a scratch for the Flyers due to an upper-body injury. Erik Johnson returned to the lineup for the first time since November 20.

FLYERS STARTING LINEUP

71 Tyson Foerster - 27 Noah Cates - 10 Bobby Brink
74 Owen Tippett - 48 Morgan Frost - 11 Travis Konecny
86 Joel Farabee - 14 Sean Couturier - 39 Matvei Michkov
80 Anthony Richard - 18 Rodrigo Abols - 19 Garnet Hathaway

6 Travis Sanheim - 9 Jamie Drysdale
8 Cam York - 55 Rasmus Ristolainen

24 Nick Seeler - 77 Erik Johnson

82 Ivan Fedotov

{33 Samuel Ersson]

PP1: Drysdale, Richard, Cates, Konecny, Foerster

PP2: Ristolainen, Frost, Cates, Brink, Michkov

Scratches: 5 Egor Zamula (upper body), 44 Nicolas Deslauriers (IR), 25 Ryan Poehling (upper body), 21 Scott Laughton (personal).

TURNING POINT

The Islanders' goals at 17:08 and 18:03 of the first period changed the entire early trajectory of the game. The Flyers never got caught up. Transition rushes hurt Philly in this game, similar to what happened in the Rangers' game the previous night.

POSTGAME 5 ("5 Things" Revisited)

1. Flyers special teams: The Islanders came into the game ranked last in the NHL on both the power play and the penalty kill. The Flyers were 0-for-1 on the power play. The penalty kill was 2-for-2.

2. Abols impressive so far: Rodrigo Abols had an excellent game at Madison Square Garden against the Rangers on Monday. He had one particularly strong shift in the second period. Overall, however, Thursday's performance was better than Friday's. Abols skated just 7:45 of ice time across 12 shifts. He was -2 on the night, had one shot on goal, one blocked shot and went 2-for-7 on faceoffs after a 9-for-10 night against the Rangers.

3. Fatigue factor: The Flyers had energy ebbs and flows over the course of Friday's game. The bigger issue was they weren't able to generate more than sporadic offense in prime scoring areas. The Nelson goal seemed to sap some energy in the second period but the Flyers made some pushes in the third period without anything truly sustained.

4. Between the pipes -- Fedotov: Fedotov didn't play poorly overall. Sorokin played better with a few timelier saves.

5. Shot suppression: The Islanders blocked 23 shot attempts for the game and limited the Flyers to just 14 shots on goal over the first 40 minutes. New York did better than Philly overall in checking the Flyers although Philly did get a transition goal to open the scoring. At the other end, the Flyers blocked a modest 13 New York shots: the second straight game where Philly snuffed out fewer shot attempts than their team average. Overall, though, it wasn't like either team generated a bushel of chances.