They were playing catch-up, not just on the scoreboard, but in footraces much of the night.
Too many of their shots were from the perimeter against Antti Niemi.
Too few rebounds in the paint, as well.
The Flyers' 2-1 loss to the streaking — in more ways than one — Dallas Stars at the Wells Fargo Center on Tuesday had much to do with a five-day layoff (see Instant Replay). Yet the Flyers made a game of it for 30 minutes and almost drew even.
They’ll play in Boston on Wednesday night, too.
“That’s a fair assessment,” Ryan White said. “I thought we fought the puck the first two periods. We were working hard but not working very smart.
“It came together in the third period. Everyone [was] able to read off each other and it made us look a little faster out there.”
Dallas has a first line that is in perpetual hyper drive with Tyler Seguin, Jamie Benn and Patrick Sharp. The Flyers simply could not keep up with them.
Seguin’s line scored both goals. The group averaged 18 minutes ice time. It simply dominated every shift. It burned defensive pair Brandon Manning and Michael Del Zotto for both goals.
“It was a challenge,” Manning said. “You give up two goals in a 2-1 game, that’s tough. You’re involved in a couple plays and they have three good players.
“We were ready for that. They had a few bounces and if you don’t make strong plays, that’s what happens.”
The Stars scored their first goal in the final 51.8 seconds of the first period with a bouncing puck following Seguin’s line into the Flyers' zone.
Benn had it. Manning couldn’t get wood on as it bounced and Seguin flipped it with a swipe motion past goalie Steve Mason, who was making his first home start of the season.
“First one was a weird play, bouncing on Manning … even when it got to Seguin it was still bouncing and he got it and it was in the air a bit,” Mason said. “A tough play.”
The second goal saw Seguin lose a faceoff to Sean Couturier to start the second period. The puck went to the wall where the Flyers made a risky play that resulted in a 2-on-1 break with Benn finishing things off with a shot down the slot.
A killer goal just 11 seconds into the middle period.
“A broken play,” coach Dave Hakstol said. “What we created was a 50-50 puck [on the faceoff] and we were trying to jump on an offensive opportunity. Their player (Alex Goligoski) had a good stick on it and just punched it up the wall and that is what created the break for them. We got a little too aggressive going the other direction.”
The way Niemi was playing — 34 saves — those two goals were enough to win because the Flyers just weren’t getting enough scoring chances inside the dots. Or rebounds.
There were a few in the game. Wayne Simmonds and Pierre-Edouard Bellemare both had chances, but not enough as a whole.
“I gotta give him credit, Niemi played a good game,” Simmonds said. “I thought we had second opportunities, sometimes third opportunities and he was stopping the puck. He was seeing things a lot tonight. Perhaps we need more hunger at the net.”
The Stars’ penalty kill shut down all four power plays, which saw the Flyers a hair off in everything they did most of the night.
Meanwhile, their top line of Michael Raffl, Claude Giroux and Jakub Voracek again combined for shots — 17 — but not enough quality chances to make a critical difference.
“There’s games like that where you get a lot of chances,” Giroux said. “We had our chances. He made a lot of good saves.”