PHILADELPHIA — The Minnesota Wild weren't happy with their play, but they were thrilled to get a much-needed win.
Ryan Hartman had two goals and Jonas Brodin and Matt Boldy scored 25 seconds apart in the third period to lead Minnesota to a 5-4 comeback victory over the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday night.
“We played good in spurts, but it was a grind,” coach Dean Evason said. “The positive thing is that we did grind continually, and we’re fortunate to get it done.”
Frederick Gaudreau also scored and Kevin Fiala had a pair of assists for the Wild, who snapped a four-game skid. Cam Talbot made 26 saves.
“When you get down in these kind of low points, it takes a game like that to kind of get out of it,” Hartman said.
Scott Laughton had a goal and an assist, and Patrick Brown, Travis Konecny and James van Riemsdyk also scored for Philadelphia. Carter Hart finished with 33 saves. The Flyers have lost 21 of their last 24 games and five of six on a club-record eight-game homestand.
“As soon as the adversity struck, we crumbled,” interim Flyers coach Mike Yeo said. “That seems to be a growing trend for us and we have to fix that.”
Minnesota entered holding a playoff spot, in third place in the West’s Central Division, but looked on the verge of losing to the East’s Metropolitan Division’s last-place team before striking for two quick goals late in the third.
Boldy tied it at 4-all with 7:44 remaining in the third. Philadelphia’s Ivan Provorov turned the puck over while trying to pass out of the defensive zone, and Fiala made a great individual effort to win a battle along the boards before finding Boldy heading to the net. Boldy’s shot went between Hart’s legs.
Brodin followed with the go-ahead goal, his fourth of the season and first since Nov. 30, on a hard slap shot through a pair of screens that went high over Hart with 7:19 to play.
“I got a pretty good open lane there, so I was trying to put everything into it,” Brodin said. “And luckily it went in.”
The Wild won for just the second time in eight games and improved to 16-14 on the road.
“It hasn’t been going our way lately and we’ve tried to be positive, stay together and get through this together,” Brodin said.
Winning has been elusive for Philadelphia for much of the season — and especially since the calendar flipped to 2022.
The Flyers were in good position for a victory, though, when van Riemsdyk put the Flyers ahead 4-3 with 45.7 seconds left in the second period on the power play when he deflected Claude Giroux’s wrister past Talbot. It snapped an 0-for-10 skid on the man-advantage for the Flyers, whose 13.8% conversion percentage entering play was third-worst in the NHL.
It also marked just the third time in the last 24 games Philadelphia eclipsed three goals in a game.
But the Flyers couldn’t hang on.
“We did some good things, but I don’t think we were very strong tonight,” Yeo said. “They cranked it up another level and we certainly didn’t.”
Hartman netted his second of the contest with 10:56 left in the second to tie it at 3-all after Konecny had given the Flyers a one-goal lead 5:07 into the period. The Wild center has 21 goals and reached 20 goals for the first time in his eight-year career.
The teams split four goals in the first period in a rare burst of offense for the Flyers, who entered tied for fourth-worst in the league with just 2.5 goals per game.
HIGH FIVE
Minnesota improved to 17-0 when scoring at least five goals in a game.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Wild: Matt Dumba (lower body) missed his ninth straight game, and Jordan Greenway (upper body) sat for the fourth in a row. Both participated in the club’s morning skate on Thursday.
Flyers: D Justin Braun (flu) went to the dressing room in the second period and did not return.
UP NEXT
Wild: At Buffalo on Friday night.
Flyers: Host Chicago on Saturday.
