Williams, Hurricanes end skid, stop Flyers streak

PHILADELPHIA -- Justin Williams had two goals and an assist, and the Carolina Hurricanes ended a six-game losing streak with a 4-1 win against the Philadelphia Flyers at Wells Fargo Center on Thursday.

Sebastian Aho had a goal and an assist, Teuvo Teravainen scored and Cam Ward made 21 saves for the Hurricanes (28-25-11), who were 0-4-2 in their previous six games.
Carolina trails the Columbus Blue Jackets by two points for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Eastern Conference.
\[WATCH: All Hurricanes vs. Flyers highlights\]
Travis Konecny scored, and Petr Mrazek made 31 saves for Philadelphia (34-20-10), which had its six-game winning streak and 12-game point streak (10-0-2) end. It was the the Flyers' first regulation loss since Feb. 1. It also was Mrazek's first loss in four games since being traded from the Detroit Red Wings on Feb. 19.
Philadelphia is second in the Metropolitan Division, one point behind the first-place Washington Capitals and two points ahead of the third-place Pittsburgh Penguins.
Williams had his first three-point game of the season and his first two-goal game since Jan. 15, 2017, against Philadelphia. The forward was selected by the Flyers with the No. 28 pick of the 2000 NHL Draft and played his first four seasons with them.
"Yes, it's special," Williams said. "My wife's family is from here, I have a lot of friends here, this is where I started. It's always special, absolutely."
Williams made it 1-0 at 4:40 of the first period. As a power play was ending, Jeff Skinner's shot from left side squeezed between Mrazek's pads, and Williams tapped it in.

"Scoring first is something that's especially big for our team," Williams said. "We haven't been great chasing leads lately. It's all great, we've got to score more absolutely, but you can't cheat to get that offense and we didn't tonight."
The Hurricanes held the Flyers to 22 shots and went 2 for 2 on the penalty kill, including killing a penalty after Noah Hanifin was called for holding at 12:02 of the third period.
"What we were able to do was play with the lead and not be high-risk in the neutral zone a little bit," Carolina coach Bill Peters said. "I thought we controlled the neutral zone for the most part and I thought the [penalty kill in the third], with the game 3-1 at the time, was huge. They get one, it's 3-2 and then you've got to manage the last eight minutes differently. They were able to get the kill and then [Aho] scored … basically put the game away."
Konecny scored 1:20 into third to make it 3-1, but Aho scored off a Williams pass at 14:23 to make it 4-1 for the Hurricanes.

Teravainen finished a give-and-go with Aho to give Carolina a 2-0 lead at 5:39 of the second period, and Williams redirected a Brett Pesce shot past Mrazek at 11:42 to make it 3-0.
Jordan Staal started the play by winning a battle behind the Philadelphia net. Staal played 18:07 in his first game back following the death of his infant daughter, Hannah. He missed three games.
"He's a lift spiritually and physically on the ice," Williams said. "You know he's going to make the right play, you know he's going to win a battle. … He's a very important piece for us clearly."
The Flyers had 43 shot attempts, too few for coach Dave Hakstol.
"In the offensive zone we were on the outside a lot," he said. "[Forty-three] shot attempts, that's not going to be enough. I didn't think we were direct enough, at times looking for one more play rather than a direct, hard play to the net. … We started both the first and second periods slow and we could never really establish anything. We had some spurts but we were never able to simplify our game enough and put together a big push."

Goal of the game

Teravainen's goal at 5:39 of the second period.

Save of the game

Ward's save on Sean Couturier at 15:01 of the first period.

Highlight of the game

Williams scored at 11:42 of the second period.

They said it

"It's March 1, they're all big. Especially for us where we're sitting. We're realists. We need to string together some wins like we unfortunately strung together some losses recently." -- Hurricanes forward Justin Williams
"They played well and I don't think we played that good to deserve to win. It's tough to do this on home ice. We can't win them all. Got to regroup and focus on Saturday now." -- Flyers forward Jakub Voracek

Need to know

Teravainen's goal was his fourth in five games. … Claude Giroux had an assist on Konecny's goal to give him 650 NHL points and tie him with Tim Kerr for sixth in Flyers history.

What's next

Hurricanes: Host the New Jersey Devils on Friday (7:30 p.m. ET; FS-CR, MSG+, NHL.TV)
Flyers: At the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday (1 p.m. ET; SUN, NBCSP, NHL.TV)