Flyers youth show out in a 5-2 season-opening win over the Devils

Chuck Fletcher and John Tortorella wanted to see what they had in their young players. Their young players showed them.

In the Flyers’ season opener Thursday, players aged 25 and under scored all five goals in a 5-2 win over the New Jersey Devils.

Wade Allison, 24, quickly responded to the Devils’ opening power-play goal by tying it up just 23 seconds later. Just over eight minutes into the game, he capitalized on the rebound of an Ivan Provorov shot and then almost toppled to the ground as he celebrated his fifth career NHL goal.

» READ MORE: ‘I’ve missed enough’: Wade Allison is ready to put his injuries behind him, do the dirty work for Flyers

Much like in the preseason, the Flyers came out lacking energy in the second. But 25-year-old Travis Konecny, a young veteran whom Fletcher challenged ahead of training camp, woke his team up halfway through the frame. Provorov, also 25, won a board battle to get the puck to Kevin Hayes in the neutral zone. Hayes, who made a nifty move to keep the play onside, found Konecny streaking up the center of the ice, and Konecny beat Devils goalie Mackenzie Blackwood clean.

“I just tried to do a lot of the right things,” Konecny said. “We started tonight, so I wanted to make sure that we were leading by example.”

Twenty-three seconds later, Morgan Frost, 23, added to the Flyers’ lead, finishing a one-timer off a Tanner Laczynski no-look pass from behind the goal line to make it 3-1.

The third period kicked off with a second goal from Konecny, this time scored on the power play. Earlier on the same power play, he had been stopped on a breakaway and later hit the post. But he kept at it and converted.

Down an injured Owen Tippett, who exited late in the first period with an upper-body injury, the Flyers’ energy dropped late in the game, and they played almost exclusively in the defensive zone the rest of the third period. But the defense and goalie Carter Hart held strong, before Frost iced the game with an empty-netter with under two minutes to play.

Sixty minutes of a 4,920-minute season is a small sample size. But it also was the first time the youth have answered the challenge Tortorella and Fletcher issued at the start of training camp.

“It’s huge because those guys are really important for us,” Konecny said. “They’re going to play a lot of good minutes for us, and they all have the skill and the ability to make plays and score.”

How do you evaluate a team with so many inexperienced players who have only started to play under a new coach’s system? Although the results now count, Tortorella’s approach is similar to the preseason. He’s looking at their effort as much as their execution.

The Flyers responded. Players were hitting hard (28 hits), sacrificing their bodies to block shots (28 blocked shots), and rushing to stick up for their teammates. It wasn’t just the players they acquired this offseason in an effort to be “tougher,” either. Noah Cates, typically a smart, detail-oriented forward, was throwing his body around. Frost was blocking shots.

“The main change you saw over camp and this first game was everybody battled,” Provorov said.

However, the execution left much to be desired. It wasn’t just about staying within the systems they’re still learning. Rather than playing simple, players were trying to do too much at times, and they didn’t always take care of the puck. There were multiple no-look passes that led to giveaways, and there were times they could have held the puck instead of throwing it away.

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The benches in the penalty box never got the chance to cool. In the first period, there were a combined six penalties. The Flyers’ box was busier than the Devils.

Through the six preseason games, the Flyers got in a lot of penalty kill practice because they were in the box a lot, and they’ve also worked on it in practice. They started Thursday out strong, clearing pucks and generating shorthanded chances of their own. Hart let in a soft opening goal, but the Flyers’ penalty kill had looked good prior.

However, so much time shorthanded clearly wore them down. Their legs slowed, and their circles got tighter.

» READ MORE: The Flyers’ Kevin Hayes is embracing John Tortorella’s challenge after the hardest year of his life

When the Flyers had the man advantage, they looked more inconsistent. They started out with good puck movement and created shots with their first unit. They then failed to set up and lost possession of the puck. They managed to get two shots on goal on that first opportunity. Their second power play yielded none. But their third, which started off messy, led to the team’s first power-play goal of the season. It was a welcome sight after the Flyers finished last in the NHL (12.6%) with the man advantage last season.

Hart, who was hurt during training camp, did not play a single preseason game. He said he wanted to, but they opted to play it safe. Instead, he tried to squeeze in as much practice as possible, but it wasn’t the same, of course.

The first 20 minutes, Hart said he felt rusty. He let in the early goal, which snuck under his right arm, but after that, he stood strong. Although his team was scored more goals than they had all preseason, they also gave up a lot of shots. Following Frost’s first goal to make it 3-1, they gave up seven shots on goal.

Hart let in one more when Damon Severson’s shot made its way through traffic, but Hart ultimately preserved the lead, stopping 35 of 37 shots.

“I thought the first goal was a bad goal, but after that, he was outstanding,” Tortorella said. “[He was] a big reason why we were able to find some good minutes. When we were struggling other minutes, he held us there.”

The Flyers host former interim coach Mike Yeo and the Vancouver Canucks at 4 p.m. Saturday.