Necas does it again: Hurricanes overcome sloppy game to edge Flyers on late goals
It’s not often you see an NHL coach come into the Lenovo Center to face the Carolina Hurricanes saying he feels good about the game.
But John Tortorella of the Philadelphia Flyers is a different kind of coach and personality, as everyone in the league knows. He also can be blunt in his remarks.
Before Tuesday’s game against the Canes, who had won six straight games, Tortorella talked of his team having good meetings and good practices. He said playing the Canes, in his mind, was “good timing.”
Tortorella’s gut feeling turned out to be wrong. While the Flyers played well, the Canes pulled out a 6-4 victory as Martin Necas, off the best start of his career, scored with 30.2 seconds left in regulation for the lead.
Necas, who also had an assist, extended his point steak to seven games, scoring on a scramble in front of the Flyers net. The Canes were patient in the Flyers zone and Jesperi Kotkaniemi got off a shot from the top of the slot, the puck bouncing past two Flyers players to Necas.
Seth Jarvis soon added an empty-net goal and Carolina (9-2-0) had its seventh straight win.
“Oh, my God, I think two or three shifts I made about 50 cutbacks,” Necas said. “We had some good zone time and actually the last time I passed it up too early and I looked up at the Jumbotron and the clock and I saw 34 seconds left. I said, ‘Oh, boy, now we’re going to have to play the overtime.’
“I was gassed, but luckily it went in. Good teams find a way to win. That’s what we did today.”
Travis Konecny had two goals and a pair of assists for the Flyers, and it was his second goal — with 10:43 left in the third period — that made it a 4-4 game.
Jack Roslovic’s goal, 29 seconds after the Flyers had scored, pushed the Canes in front, 4-3, at 1:47 of the third. Roslovic had an empty net after Sebastian Aho drove the net and quickly deposited the puck for his seventh goal in 11 games.
Roslovic’s score came after the Flyers’ Morgan Frost barely got the puck across the goal line with an open net. Frost mostly whiffed on the puck, which ever so slowly made it in the net for a 3-3 tie.
It was a night when Canes rookie Jackson Blake scored his fourth goal of the season, when Eric Robinson and Jordan Martinook both scored in a 54-second span in the second for a 3-1 Carolina lead.
It was a game that matched goalies Pyotr Kochetkov of the Canes against the Flyers’ Aleksei Kolosov. Kochetkov, making his fourth consecutive start, faced 16 shots -- just six in the final two periods -- while and Kolosov faced 34 shots in his third NHL game.
“I don’t think we were as sharp,” Canes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “That was probably the first game this year when I didn’t like how the first period went. You could tell we were a little off.
“But in the second and third periods, we didn’t give up a ton. It never felt right there, but a couple of guys dragged us into the fight. ... Marty Necas kind of took over there at the end. Sometimes, you’ve got to win that way.”
The Canes’ Andrei Svechnikov and then Jordan Staal took penalties in the first period, allowing the Flyers to have a 5-on-3 power play. The Flyers promptly converted, Konecny tapping in the rebound of a shot by rookie forward Matvei Michkov.
The Canes killed off the Staal penalty, then got a goal from its fourth line. Blake was alone at the top of the crease, taking a no-look pass from Jack Drury after defenseman Dmitry Orlov got the puck low to Drury. For Jackson, who was unchecked in front, it was his fourth of the season.
“I saw him out of the corner of my eye,” Drury said.
The Canes had the two goals in 54-second sequence in the second period to open up a 3-1 lead as Robinson and then Martinook scored.
Robinson’s second of the season came off the rush, off a crisp pass from Necas. Martinook then scored his first of the season in typical Martinook fashion, going to the front of the net, outbattling defenseman Emil Andrae and backhanding the puck past Kolosov.
The Flyers’ Owen Tippett made it a 3-2 game later in the second with a snipe from the left circle that beat Kochetekov. Tippett, who usually plays well against the Canes, scored his second of the season and it was a one-goal game heading into the third.
Tippett first kept a Jaccob Slavin clearing attempt in the zone near the blue line, then took a pass from Konecny as he went to the net.
This story was originally published November 5, 2024 at 9:42 PM.
