Travis Konecny scores twice in Flyers' 5-3 win over Blue Jackets

Jackie Spiegel, The Philadelphia Inquirer on Dec 10, 2024

Published in Hockey

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COLUMBUS, Ohio — Speaking to the media before the Philadelphia Flyers’ morning skate coach John Tortorella was asked about his team’s consistency of late.

“I thought the game [stunk], quite honestly,” he said of the Flyers 4-2 loss to the Utah Hockey Club on Sunday. “There wasn’t a lot of energy from either team. I don’t expect that to happen again with us.”

Message received as the Flyers dominated in a 5-3 win against the Columbus Blue Jackets, with three of their four lines getting on the board. The Orange and Black snapped a three-game losing streak.

Top line winger Travis Konecny scored a pair in the second period, with his first marker coming on the man advantage. After Bobby Brink helped Matvei Michkov keep the puck in, Michkov fed Konecny at the top of the right face-off circle. The winger skated down and snapped the puck home past Blue Jacket goalie Elvis Merzļikins.

With 1 minute left in the middle frame, he notched his 15th of the season to give the Flyers a 4-1 lead. On a breakout, Joel Farabee got the puck on the left boards and sent a pass from the Flyers’ blue line across to a streaking Konecny down the right side. He got behind the Blue Jackets defense, pump-faked, and slid the puck in the five-hole for his fifth multi-goal game of the season.

The Flyers’ second line got a pair of goals, one from Owen Tippett and another from Morgan Frost. Tippett made it 2-0 in the first period with his fifth goal in five games. Off a rush that saw Frost dish the puck to a flying Jamie Drysdale, the Flyers defenseman then kicked it over to Tippett, who sent it on goal from the above the right circle.

Frost made it 5-1 in the third period when he kept the puck in at the right point, battled Blue Jackets defenseman Jordan Harris, and got the puck in deep. He went to the net and was fed a nifty centering pass by Michkov from the right corner, but was stopped before burying the puck from the bottom of the left circle.

Noah Cates and the third line got the ball rolling with his second goal of the season less than five minutes into the game. Tyson Foerster came off the boards and cut to the net, putting a hard wrister on Elvis Merzlikins. The puck came up on the Columbus goalie, went up in the air and when it came down Cates knocked it.

Zach Werenski scored on a one-timer for the Blue Jackets in the second period to make it 3-1. Sean Monahan made it 5-2 with a tip in front of Flyers goalie Sam Ersson and Kent Johnson made it 5-3 with a goal in the last few seconds of the game.

Breakaways

Defensemen Egor Zamula and Erik Johnson were healthy scratches. … Nick Seeler dropped the gloves with Mathieu Olivier in the second period. It didn’t come long after Olivier came out of the box for elbowing Emil Andrae along the boards.

Up next

The Flyers head back to Philly to host the Detroit Red Wings on Thursday (7 p.m. ET, NBCSP).