PHILADELPHIA — No captain Gabriel Landeskog, no winger Valeri Nichushkin, no winger Artturi Lehkonen for the reigning Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche, due to injury. That was (almost) no problem for the Flyers, who have been decimated by injuries of their own for the last two seasons.
The Avalanche showed up to the Wells Fargo Center on Monday night without seven key players and lost an eighth in center Nathan MacKinnon in the first period. The win-deprived Flyers pounced on their prey and handed them a 5-3 defeat, marking the Flyers’ second victory in their last 14 games. They received scoring contributions from the usual suspects — defensemen Travis Sanheim, Tony DeAngelo, and winger Owen Tippett — and an unusual one — forward Tanner Laczynski, who checked back into the lineup on Monday after sitting out as a healthy scratch on Saturday against the New Jersey Devils.
However, the Avalanche mounted a late push with the Flyers up, 4-1, as winger Mikko Rantanen scored with just over two minutes remaining in the third and center Alex Newhook cut the Flyers’ lead to one with a minute and a half left. The Flyers closed out the scoring with a Travis Konecny empty-net goal.
