Flyers overcome early deficit, slow down Sharks

PHILADELPHIA -- Travis Konecny and Christian Dvorak each had a goal and an assist for the Philadelphia Flyers in a 4-1 win against the San Jose Sharks at Xfinity Mobile Arena on Tuesday.

Carl Grundstrom and Noah Cates also scored for Philadelphia (16-9-3), which won for the fifth time in seven games. Dan Vladar made 17 saves.

"Obviously, they're a really good team," Vladar said. "We know they're feeding off the rush. Sometimes they might be getting a little cute, but they still have high-end skill on their end. I thought we grinded through and an important two points for us."

Collin Graf scored for San Jose (14-14-3), which lost for the third time in its past four (1-3-0). Alex Nedeljkovic made 26 saves.

"They got on us early, and we just couldn't get out of it," Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said. "We had good energy (at the start), I thought a good game plan on how we wanted to approach this one, and we obviously didn't execute it."

Graf scored for the third straight game to make it 1-0 at 11:33 on the Sharks' first shot of the game. John Klingberg faked out Vladar by drawing the goalie out to the left post. Instead of taking the shot, Klingberg passed across the slot to Graf who netted the one-timer.

Dvorak tied the game 1-1 at 18:39 with his first goal in 10 games. Konecny's high flip out of the zone landed between Dvorak and Trevor Zegras, and Dvorak pushed it between the skates of Sharks defenseman Sam Dickinson before skating in and deking Nedeljkovic.

"'TK' did a good job flipping the puck out of the zone, and actually just hit Trevor on the top of the head, and I was able to get behind the [defenseman] there and had a breakaway," Dvorak said. "So good header by 'Ziggy' [Zegras]."

Dvorak, who also won 14 of 17 face-offs, has 19 points (seven goals, 12 assists) in 28 games, more than halfway to the 33 points (12 goals, 21 assists) he had in 82 games last season with the Montreal Canadiens.

He signed a one-year, $5.4 million contract with the Flyers on July 1.

"He was more in a defensive role in Montreal, more on the fourth line," Flyers coach Rick Tocchet said. "And I think he's getting a chance. He saw the opportunity here with our situation and I think that he's grabbing it."

Konecny said having Dvorak as the center between him and Zegras has allowed them to play a bit freer.

"He's that guy that, unfortunately, sometimes when you're playing with myself or 'Z,' we're leaning offense sometimes, and he seems to be a guy that's going to be in the right spots," Konecny said. "If there's a mistake, we don't want that, but he's got the mindset of protecting and cleaning up a lot of errors that I'm making. He's also got a lot of [offense] too, so I think he's all around a really good player and I've enjoyed playing with him."

Konecny had the secondary assist on Dvorak's goal for his 500th NHL point.

"It's awesome. ... But I think for me, where I'm at in my career, those are good, but I just want to be in the (Stanley Cup) Playoffs," Konecny said.

Grundstrom put the Flyers ahead 2-1 at 3:20 of the second period when he deflected Nick Seeler's shot from the blue line. It was Grundstrom's first goal of the season, and came in his first game against his former team -- the Sharks traded Grundstrom to the Flyers on Oct. 5.

"You always want to beat your old team, that's for sure," Grundstrom said. "So it feels really good."

Cates' wrist shot found the back of the net at 19:48 to put the Flyers ahead 3-1. He settled a saucer pass from Bobby Brink on the rush to score from the left face-off circle.

It was a goal Nedeljkovic wishes he had played differently.

"[Cates] gets off a good shot, he gets it off quick, it's low," Nedeljkovic said. "It's a tough save, that low blocker shot. I get a piece of it. If I'm in the right position there and I'm on pucks, that's probably hitting me square in the blocker and we're going into the third period down one goal, not two, and maybe can play with a little bit more freedom knowing that we only need one, not two."

Konecny closed the scoring with an empty-net goal at 18:17, assisted by Dvorak.

NOTES: The Sharks signed goalie Justin Kowalkoski to an amateur tryout contract Tuesday to serve as Nedeljkovic's backup. Goalie Yaroslav Askarov was out because of an illness. Warsofsky said he wasn't sure if Askarov would be available for the Sharks' next game at the Toronto Maple Leafs on Thursday. ... Flyers defenseman Ty Murchison had three hits in 14:56 of ice time in his NHL debut. ... Philadelphia went 2-for-2 on the penalty kill, ending a streak of five straight games allowing a power-play goal. ... Konecny has eight points (three goals, five assists) during a five-game point streak.