POSTGAME 5: Adversity Strikes Hard

HERE'S WHAT HAPPENED

After winning each of their first four games of the 2020 postseason, the Flyers will now have to overcome some adversity. The Montreal Canadiens laid a 5-0 whipping on Philadelphia on Friday afternoon at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto. The First Round is now tied, 1-1.

Tomas Tatar Jesperi Kotkaniemi staked the Canadiens to a 2-0 lead in the first period. Tatar scored again at 1:25 of the second period to open a 3-0 lead. A deflection off the skate of Shayne Gostisbehere was credited to Joel Armia as the Montreal lead grew to 4-0. Kotkaniemi added his second goal of the game at 10:35 of the third period. Max Domi collected three assists for Montreal.

Carter Hart played much better than his stats would indicate: four goals against on 26 shots across 37:57 of play. Brian Elliott went the rest of the way, stopping five of six shots. Carey Price earned a 30-save shutout.

TURNING POINT

The Canadiens took the play to the get-go right from the outset. A bad tone was set when the Flyers got scrambled in their own zone on the sequence that led to a wide-open Tomas Tatar scoring from point-blank range just 62 seconds after the opening face-off. Things only got worse for the Flyers thereafter.

MELTZER'S TAKE

* The 1st period was a flat out butt-kicking. The Canadiens forechecked at will, and attacked in waves. Hart was hung out to dry on both Montreal goals, with both defensemen on the same side, no help in front from a forward and a Canadien in point blank range. Hart was without a stick on the Kotkaniemi goal sequence. Shots ended up 16-6, shot attempts 34-16, scoring chances.

* The Flyers' hole became a crater when Justin Braun heavily screened Hart on Tatar's power play goal that made it a 3-0 game. Philadelphia had a great chance to climb back into the game on a 5-on-3 power play but generated little more than forced cross-seam passes and unscreened point shot. The Flyers play picked up after that -- they finally got some extended forechecking pressure -- but they couldn't make any headway.

* The Flyers did little with their carryover power play time to start the third period. Passes were off the mark and players were knocked off pucks. At 10:35, Montreal scored its second power play goal of the game, as Kotkaniemi moved over the middle from the hash marks and snapped a shot past Elliott. Shea Weber kept the Montreal shutout going when he clocked a would-be shorthanded goal.

* As would be expected in such an ugly game, the Flyers changed around line combinations, including reuniting Jakub Voracek with Sean Couturier and Claude Giroux and switching the partners on the 2nd and third pairs.

* Travis Konecny limped off of the tunnel after blocking a shot off his skate in the middle part of the third period.

STATISTICALLY SPEAKING

* The Flyers surrendered the first goal of the game in playoffs for the first time and for the first time trailed in a game.

* The Flyers did not record a shot on goal for the first 17 minutes of the game and were outshot, 12-0 by the Habs at that point.

* The Flyers trailed by three goals in a game for the first time in nearly six months - since being down 0-3 to the Tampa Bay Lightning on Feb. 15.

* Ivan Provorov led the team in ice-time (23:49), shots on goal (5) and blocked shots (6).

* Both Sean Couturier and Claude Giroux went 75% on face-offs winning 9 of 12 draws.

* Today's game saw a combined 50 penalty minutes (MTL: 24 | PHI: 26).