Fraser Minten’s second goal of the season capped a three-goal third period for the Boston Bruins in a 5-1 win over the visiting Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday afternoon.
Pavel Zacha and Mason Lohrei scored to give Boston leads after the first two periods before the emphatic finish. Marat Khusnutdinov and Casey Mittelstadt also lit the lamp, while JJ Peterka also had two assists.
Jeremy Swayman made 14 saves en route to the Bruins’ second straight win and fourth through their first six games.
Boston finished with a 32-15 shots on goal advantage.
Porter Martone scored a power-play goal and Dan Vladar (27 saves) took the loss for Philadelphia, which remains winless at 0-4-2 on the season. The Flyers were missing forward Travis Konecny (lower-body) and defenseman Cam York (upper-body) due to day-to-day injuries.
Zacha’s first goal of the season at the 12:24 mark punctuated a dominant opening period in which Boston held a 12-3 edge in shots, including holding Philadelphia without a chance during its first power play.
Less than one minute after the Bruins completed a solid kill, David Pastrnak moved into the zone off a turnover at the blue line dropped a backhand pass for Zacha, whose shot from the high slot leaked through Vladar and dribbled over the goal line for the opening tally.
The visitors went without a shot for more than half of the second period, but Swayman stood up to the task of Porter Martone’s driving backhander with 9:51 to go.
Lohrei doubled Boston’s lead with 2:48 left in the middle frame. After Swayman’s save on a David Jiricek point shot created an odd-man rush, Minten started the play and Peterka fed the trailing defenseman for a top-shelf wrister coming to the top of the circles.
The Bruins needed only 1:55 of third-period time to make it a 3-0 game, as Khusnutdinov slammed home Minten’s pass from behind the net following a crisp sequence between the duo and defenseman Will Borgen.
Martone broke the shutout at 6:32, placing a tight-angle wrister from the left circle upstairs on Swayman.
At 9:21, Boston regained its three-goal advantage after Casey Mittelstadt joined Lohrei with a second goal in as many games. After James Hagens had an initial shot saved by Vladar, he made a diagonal pass to Elias Lindholm in the bottom of the right circle, and Mittelstadt buried it in front.
Minten put the exclamation point on the victory with 4:01 to go, speeding past a defender and down the left side to slip a quick shot five-hole on Vladar.
–Field Level Media
