Well, so much for a revitalized power play, or much of a spark.
The Flyers got jumped for two shorthanded goals and still lacked any kind of finish in front of the net to lose to the Washington Capitals, 4-1, Tuesday night at the Wells Fargo Center – in the first of a home-and-home back-to-back.
The Flyers are 1-4-1, now having lost five straight across regulation and overtime. They have only scored once in front of the home crowd after two games, haven’t scored on the power play since last week’s loss to Seattle on the road (haven’t held a lead since either), and obviously, haven’t won since the season opener in Vancouver.
It’s hardly the start that anyone in the organization had in mind.
But that’s just the way the bounces have gone for them so far, as boos rained down from an emptying arena as the final seconds ticked down.
Sean Couturier, in his move back to center, rifled a shot off the crossbar from a neutral zone turnover seconds in, then the Flyers got their first power play look a couple of minutes later when Washington’s Alex Ovechkin got tagged for interference on Garnet Hathaway at center ice.
Rotten luck struck with about 30 seconds left on the advantage.
The puck wrapped down to defenseman Egor Zamula by the boards at the blue line, but trying to control it with a kick of his skate, he instead bounced it straight to the Capitals’ Nic Dowd, who chipped it by then took off for the Flyers’ net, beating Ersson with a move and a nasty backhander top shelf to make it 1-0, Washington not even five minutes in.
The Flyers were operating from behind from there, and try as they might, could never swing that clean look or bounce they needed to shift the momentum or at the least just get them on the board.
Nic Deslauriers hopped on the ice and immediately dropped the gloves with the Capitals’ Dylan McIlrath in a straight-up slugfest hoping it offered a jolt, but that just as quickly got canceled out by a Travis Konecny slash in the offensive zone that put the Flyers on the penalty kill.
Hathaway sprung Konecny out of the box as the penalty expired with a stretch pass from the defensive zone all the way to the far blue line that the winger had to dive after to stop, yet still with time to move in and get a shot off, but once he got up, he placed a shot that Capitals goaltender Charlie Lindgren kicked away with his pad.
Scott Laughton – who made the lineup in time after he and his wife welcomed their first child into the world earlier in the day – chased down a lob over center ice while the Flyers were killing off a Nick Seeler high-sticking call later in the period, and broke toward the net but with a shot that sailed wide.
Then struck rotten luck again.
Connor McMichael caught Brink playing with the puck for too long by the left point and stripped it away from him, shifting the Capitals into transition. Zamula lost his assignment as Andrew Mangiapane came streaking down through the middle unmarked, and all McMichael had to do was flip it to him from off the wall to leave Mangiapane all alone with the shot to beat Ersson to make it 2-0.
The Flyers pressed into the second period and took their growing frustrations with them, but nothing amounted from it.
Matvei Michkov, who hasn’t scored since he did it twice in that third game at Edmonton, continued to show flashes of his high-end skill, but his line with Couturier and Owen Tippett continually got themselves tied up in traffic trying to make something happen.
In the third, after offsetting roughing penalties from a scrum at the end of the second period put the teams at 4-on-4 with Konecny and Jakob Chychrun in the box, something finally broke.
Michkov and Cam York cycled it around to Travis Sanheim with a clean look from the left point, and the defenseman’s shot beat Lindgren to the top corner to finally give the Flyers one, and the fans, briefly, something to cheer about…
Then the Capitals came right back down the ice to go back up two, 3-1. Dylan Strome knocked the puck away from Jamie Drysdale while he was trying to shield it at the blue line, and on the zone entry, Capitals defenseman John Carlson threw the puck to the front of the net as Strome crashed down.
The puck bounced off Strome and in, Zamula wanted to play the stick lift but was too late to it. It was a brutal night for him, in what’s quickly becoming a brutal season for the young Russian blueliner.
And it’s become a brutal stretch for the Flyers in general.
There was no coming back from Strome’s goal to put the Capitals back up two, and with just under six minutes left, Chychrun put one through to tack on one more.
The Flyers will be right back it Wednesday night down in Washington, just hoping now that they can get something to break the right way.
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