ST. LOUIS -- Although the past two games ended in shootout loses vs. two of the NHL’s best teams, those defeats have been at the end of a brutal yet successful stretch of games for the Flyers against the league’s elite.
Starting three weekends ago, the Flyers beat Pittsburgh twice and St. Louis once in regulation, topped Chicago in overtime and lost to Los Angeles before the shootout losses to Boston and St. Louis, a scoreless draw through 65 minutes on Tuesday at the Scottrade Center.
That’s 10 of 14 possible points. Not bad for a team that struggled early and fired its coach, then rebounded under a new coach in Craig Berube.
“It’s been a tough stretch of games against teams that have been dominant all year. It puts us in right there with the elite teams in the league,” Scott Hartnell said. “It’s frustrating not to get the second point tonight, but (Ray Emery) played awesome, our D was solid and our forwards did a good job of getting chances. (Ryan) Miller played a great game as well.”
The Blues’ Miller finished with 31 saves, and Emery made 28. The shutout counts as his second of the season and the 21st of his career (see game recap). His performance Tuesday allowed Berube to give No. 1 goalie Steve Mason some much-needed rest.
“Razor has been incredible. He’s doing a great job of stopping pucks and moving it to our D and stuff,” Hartnell said. “It’s great when you have two goalies who can go in there and win every night.
“He definitely won us a point tonight. In two weeks when the season is over, we’ll see how big the point is.”
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The point gave the Flyers 87 for the season on a record of 39-27-9. The Flyers are third in the Metropolitan Division, four points ahead of Columbus, their opponent Thursday at the Wells Fargo Center.
“It’s one point, and every one is huge,” said Micahel Raffl, adding the Flyers more than held their own against the NHL’s elite. “We checked hard, we played pretty good defense, and we stayed in those games.”