Flyers Shut Vancouver Down at the Border

The Vancouver Canucks (12-9-4) made a visit to the city of Brotherly Love to take on the hometown, Philadelphia Flyers (12-7-5) in the spacious Wells Fargo Center on a brisk Monday evening.

Philadelphia was fresh off a disheartening loss at the hands of the reeling Calgary Flames less than 48 hours earlier. The Flyers offense has been sputtering while the defense has been rock solid.

The Canucks would flash their defense in the opening stanza and kept the Flyers on the perimeter which made life easy on San Diego native, Thatcher Demlko who easily turned aside 8 Philadelphia shots.

His counterpart, Carter Hart was equal to the eight of nine Canuck shots but was helpless when JT Miller lit the lamp at the 10:34 mark to put Vancouver up, 1-0.

A welcomed sign for the Flyers, Jake Voracek got on the score sheet and assisted on a Sean Couturier goal mouth scramble that tied things up at 5:54 of the middle period.

The Flyers were able to open up lanes while sniffing out any Canuck chances.

A huge dominating stanza witnessed the home boys totally dominate and outshot Vancouver, 17-4.

Scoring woes were still prevalent and the second ended with a 1-1 standoff.

The Philly faithful were a bit restless with the lack of production from so much domination. They would be calmed when Justin Braun fought his way through traffic and hit Voracek for a highlight goal with 8:33 to play.

Could the Flyboys grind it out? The Canucks were laying pressure and seemed to have the game tied with twenty seconds remaining but Carter Hart snuffed out an apparent goal and Philly pick upped a morale-boosting victory, 2-1.

Blue Lines: The goaltenders were on center stage. Carter Hart kicked aside 16 of 17 chances while his counterpart, Desko, was outstanding with 32 saves.

The faceoffs favored Philly, 32-20 with Claude Giroux and Kevin Hayes winning nine with Sean Couturier throwing in 8.

Bo Horvat won 14 of the Canucks 20.

Kevin Neibauer

Kevin has followed and promoted the game of lacrosse since May 19, 1974.
The same day the Philadelphia Flyers won the Cup, the Philadelphia Wings were introduced to Neibauer and Philadelphia.

Kevin has covered many sports, including baseball, football, basketball, and.. lacrosse. A former licensed football referee and baseball umpire, Kevin brings a unique insight to his game coverage.

A published writer in JustHockey Magazine, Kevin covered the American Hockey League as well as a monthly story on a pugilist where Kevin used the pen name, The Rink Rat. Neibauer turned his attentions to lacrosse for a few years and does his part, whether podcasting or writing to grow the game. Kevin branched out to his roots and currently provides insight for all Philadelphia teams for Edge of Philly as well as his full-time duties with LaxPhilly.