Philadelphia 5 Calgary 4
CALGARY — Going to the tough areas of the ice has Philadelphia Flyers left-winger Scott Hartnell well on his way to a career season.
Hartnell scored his 29th and 30th goals — both on third period deflections, and Matt Read scored the shootout winner Saturday night as the Flyers overcame a 3-0 second period deficit to beat the Calgary Flames 5-4.
Hartnell reaches the 30-goal mark for the second time in his career, having finished with 30 goals in the 2008-09 season.
“Hartsy’s having a breakout year and it’s a credit to him playing with some great players in (Claude) Giroux and (Jaromir) Jagr, but going to the net, he makes room for himself and he gets those tough goals,” says Flyers defenceman Braydon Coburn.
“This time of year, you’ve got to score goals from in front of the net, you’ve got to have screens because all these goalies are so good. You’ve got to have guys that are willing to get to the front and it’s not easy.”
Read, who was Philadelphia’s fifth shooter, broke a 1-1 deadlock in the shootout beating Miikka Kiprusoff on a quick shot inside the goal post.
“I was just trying to see where he was and look for an open spot,” said Read, who has gone 11 games without a goal in regulation. “I was thinking shoot the whole way and his glove wasn’t all the way up and I just shot it and hoped and it went in.”
The Flyers comeback began after a short-handed goal by Tom Kostopoulos put Calgary ahead 3-0 at 12:55 of the second.
Over a furious final seven minutes of the second, the Flyers outshot the Flames 12-2 and scored twice to climbing within a goal headed to the second intermission.
At 15:47, Jakub Voracek wristed a 15-footer past Kiprusoff as he cut to the net off the wing. With 34 seconds left in the period, Coburn scored a rare goal, his third of the year bouncing in off the leg of Flames defenceman Scott Hannan.
Philadelphia tied it 3-3 on Hartnell’s deflection at 7:35 of the third period. The goal came on a two-man advantage after Matt Stajan was sent off for boarding 27 seconds into a too-many men on the ice penalty.
Calgary went back in front 4-3 at 10:49 on a penalty-shot goal by Alex Tanguay, but Hartnell responded again. Set up in front of the net again, just like his previous goal, this time he got a piece of a shot from Nicklas Grossman.
The win vaults Philadelphia (34-20-7) over New Jersey into fourth place in the Eastern Conference.
“It’s a good character builder for this team,” said Read. “We’ve got a lot of guys who can put the puck in the net. We just want to keep it going. We had a lot of opportunities, a lot of shots tonight, if we just have that belief.”
Mark Giordano and Stajan scored the other goals for Calgary (28-23-11), who has lost five times in its last 10 games in extra time — twice in overtime, three times in a shootout.
“It’s no secret, we’re having a tough time right now playing with the lead,” said Flames captain Jarome Iginla. “The good part is we’re getting it and we’re having real, solid first periods. But it slowly slips away from us.”
By only earning a single point, the Flames fall to 11th place in the Western Conference, one point back of Dallas, Los Angeles and Colorado, who are tied for eighth place.
“We keep finding ways to shoot ourselves in the foot. Tonight, we gave them a five-on-three. We’re lucky to get a point tonight,” said Tanguay.