Five Flyers score in 5-2 win vs. Sabres

Jackie Spiegel, The Philadelphia Inquirer on Dec 3, 2025

Published in Hockey

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PHILADELPHIA — With leading scorer Tyson Foerster out 2-3 months after getting injured in Monday’s 5-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins, there were questions about how the Flyers would find offense.

The answer? Easily.

The Flyers beat the Buffalo Sabres, 5-2, for their fourth win in the past five games. Since losing two straight in mid-November to the Ottawa Senators, they have gone 7-3-0 and have not lost two in a row since.

They did lose defenseman Cam York late in the second period. After Trevor Zegras was boarded by Sabres captain Rasmus Dahlin in the offensive zone, York was involved in a scrum. He did not return with an undisclosed injury. Dahlin was assessed a five-minute major and was ejected from the game, but the Flyers did not score on the power play.

But they had already scored a pair with the man advantage. It came in the first period when the Flyers scored a trio of goals after — no surprise here — trailing 1-0.

Travis Konecny scored on the power play to tie the game 1-1 while on the ice with the revamped unit of Zegras, Travis Sanheim, Owen Tippett and Matvei Michkov. Konecny got the puck along the boards and carried it above the left face-off circle and toward the middle before putting the puck past the blocker of Sabres goalie Colton Ellis for his sixth goal of the season.

The Sabres challenged the call with Tippett in front but the video review confirmed that there was no interference before the goal. Because of the failed challenge, the Flyers went right back on the power play.

Zegras scored his 10th goal of the season on the ensuing man advantage. It tied him with Foerster for the team lead.

The Flyers moved the puck around the outside well. Konecny skated down the left boards before sending the puck back to Sanheim to open space. The defenseman saw Zegras with his stick up in the air awaiting the pass above the right circle and after receiving it put the puck toward the net.

Zegras’ shot ended up going off the skate of Buffalo’s Ryan McLeod to give the Flyers the lead 38 seconds after tying the game.

Twenty-one seconds later, it was 3-1. After putting the follow line of Noah Cates, Bobby Brink and Nikita Grebenkin — who was promoted to the top nine after the Foerster injury — on the ice, the trio connected.

Grebenkin deflected a pass intended for Tage Thomson and collected the puck inside the blue line and fed Brink, who dropped it to Cates. The center put the puck on goal and Brink cleaned up the rebound for his seventh goal of the season. It gave the Flyers three goals in 59 seconds.

In the second period, it was Brink who fed Cates for the goal seconds after a Flyers power play ended. Jamie Drysdale got the loose puck and carried it to the middle of the ice before dishing to Brink atop the right circle. He carried it down and set up Cates for a redirect and his sixth of the season.

Later in the period, Tippett made it 5-1 with his third goal in three games. Emil Andrae kept the puck in at the blue line and sent it down the boards to Sean Couturier who sent a no-look pass to Michkov. The Russian winger than did the same to Tippett with Mattias Samuelsson, the son of former Flyers defenseman Kjell Samuelsson, on it.

Tippett went backhand to forehand and had his initial shot go off Ellis’s shoulder. But he stuck with it and battled the puck out of midair before it went in.

Coach Rick Tocchet won’t like the first goal the Flyers gave up. After Monday’s game he chastised the penalty kill, citing that he didn’t like the structure. He prefers an aggressive diamond and hates the box. Well, the goal by Sabres’ Jason Zucker was because the penalty kill fell into the box and he scored in front off a pass by Josh Doan.

Buffalo’s second goal of the night, which made it 4-2, came off the stick of Bowen Byram. On a bouncing puck, the defenseman fired the puck past Flyers goalie Sam Ersson.

Breakaways

The Flyers now have 11 comeback wins and are 10-6-2 after trailing first. Both lead the NHL. … Ersson made 24 saves and the Flyers put 35 shots on goal. … Forward Carl Grundström, who was recalled from Lehigh Valley of the American Hockey League on Tuesday, and defenseman Noah Juulsen were the healthy scratches. … The Flyers challenged a goal by the Sabres in the third period and it was determined Buffalo was offside.

Up next

The Flyers have a few days between games, but next face the NHL’s top team, the Colorado Avalanche, on Sunday. How good are the Avalanche? They’ve lost once in regulation this season.