ST. LOUIS — Owen Tippett scored the tiebreaking goal with 5:33 left, sending the Philadelphia Flyers to a 4-2 win over the St. Louis Blues on Monday night.
The surging Flyers won their fourth straight and swept their three-game trip through Minnesota, Winnipeg and St. Louis. Philadelphia has won five of six overall.
Tippett got the puck after a turnover at center ice, split the St. Louis defense and used a quick backhand-forehand move to score his 16th goal of the season on his 10th shot on goal in the game.
“It was just one of those ones that kind of opened up,” Tippett said. “Obviously, was looking shot first, but the (defenseman) kind of stood up and made himself small and I was able to kind of get around him.”
Flyers coach John Tortorella likes what he is seeing out of Tippett, who has four goals in his last five games.
“I said the other night, if he hits the net more, he’d probably have five or six more goals right now,” Tortorella said. “He’s one of those athletes that develops on his own and he has a chance to be a really good player.”
Joel Farabee added an empty-netter with 53 seconds remaining.
Scott Laughton and Ryan Poehling also scored for the Flyers. Carter Hart made 28 saves to improve to 6-2-3 in his last 11 starts.
Oskar Sundqvist and Brandon Saad scored for the Blues, who finished a 1-2-1 homestand. Joel Hofer made 38 saves.
“I think we got what we deserved,” interim coach Drew Bannister said. “For 40 minutes, we didn’t have enough effort in our game in hard areas. We continue to mismanage the puck. That is making it difficult on our team. We have to defend, which makes it easy for them. More offensive zone time, more shots at the net.”
After a scoreless first period, Laughton beat Hofer at 1:03 of the second to snap a 10-game goal drought. A turnover in the Blues zone created an odd-man rush and Garnet Hathaway’s shot caromed off Hofer’s pad right to Laughton’s stick for a wide-open rebound shot.
Sundqvist’s power-play goal evened it at 18:19. Brayden Schenn, playing in his 900th career game, used a toe drag to get off a quick wrister that created a rebound opportunity for Sundqvist.
“I think off the rush, we tried to find late guys and stuff like that,” Schenn said. “They backcheck hard, nothing was there and we didn’t play below the top of the circles enough and work them down there.”
Poehling showed off some impressive hand-eye coordination to regain the lead for the Flyers. Egor Zamula’s shot bounced off Hofer’s pad into the air, and Poehling swatted it off Jordan Kyrou and into the net to give Philadelphia a 2-1 lead with 6.2 seconds left in the second.
Saad got a lucky bounce of his own to tie it at 1:18 of the third. Poehling had lost his stick and Schenn’s centering pass hit the stick, essentially teeing up the puck for Saad.
“They tie it up and sometimes you can go either way, especially after a long trip, a long number of days here,” Tortorella said. “I thought our guys went the right way. They just kept on playing.”
UP NEXT
Flyers: Host Dallas on Thursday night.
Blues: Play at Washington on Thursday night.
