COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Thursday night's Flyers-Blue Jackets game could have been played in the New Jersey Governor’s Mansion. This matchup had some meat on it, and it was full of intriguing subplots.
The Jackets were playing the 1,000th game in their checkered history. They had won their previous seven, a franchise record. Their goaltender, Sergei Bobrovsky, was making his first start against his former team.
The Flyers were skating through a touch of mid-winter adversity. They played a snow-postponed game at the Wells Fargo Center the night before, flew from one frigid city to another and had to find a way to finish an unplanned back-to-back.
The real measure of the game, of course, was in the standings.
The Jackets defeated the Flyers 5-2 in front of 15,571 at Nationwide Arena. With that, the Jackets (26-20-4) moved ahead of the Flyers (25-21-6) and into third place in the Metropolitan Division.
Ray Emery was in the net for the Flyers. He has allowed 10 goals in two starts against the Jackets this season.
NHL
The Flyers have lost two in a row. They are 2-4-2 in their past eight games.
The Jackets took a 3-2 lead into the third period. Brandon Dubinsky (wrist shot from the hash marks) and Nathan Horton (undressed Andrej Meszaros and beat Emery top-shelf) scored within 3 minutes, 25 seconds of one another to put it out of reach.
Bobrovsky is 9-0 in his last nine starts.
First shot
As they did against Carolina on Wednesday, the Flyers got off to a slow start in Columbus. Their first shot on net came at 5:38, a Brayden Schenn wrist shot that Bobrovsky handled easily. (Their first shot against Carolina came at 7:54.)
First goal
It was a funny one. Jackets defenseman Jack Johnson tossed an innocent-looking floater in from the right wall. The puck went off the inside of Luke Schenn’s knee, backwards through Schenn’s legs and found the inside of the left post.
It was Johnson’s first goal since Game 4, a span of 45 games. It gave the Jackets a 1-0 lead at 8:20 of the first period.
Special teams
Scott Hartnell took a double-minor -- two for tripping, two for slashing -– at 8:20 of the first period. Hartnell didn’t like the one penalty, or maybe the other, it was hard to tell. In any case, the Flyers did yeoman’s work killing off the four minutes. They did not allow the Jackets a shot in that span.
Vincent Lecavalier scored a power-play goal on a one-timer from the right circle at 7:21 of the second period. It was the Flyers’ seventh power-play goal in eight games. It gave them a 2-1 lead, which was short-lived.
More special teams
The Jackets apparently made some tactical adjustments to their own power play. With a man advantage late in the second, the Jackets totally hemmed in the Flyers. It was a shooting gallery. Emery held until the final seconds of Braydon Coburn’s holding penalty -- and then Matt Calvert scored, on the doorstep, with a twist of his right skate. That gave the Jackets a 3-2 lead.
Still more special teams
The Flyers had a man advantage, and a brief, two-man advantage, over the last 1:41 of the second period.
They had 19 seconds of two-man advantage followed by 76 seconds of man advantage at the start of the third period.
They did not cash in.
Riding Mason
Flyers goaltender Steve Mason would have started this game if not for the snowstorm, and the unplanned back-to-back. Mason, of course, won the Calder Trophy during the playoffs in 2008-09 -– when he carried the Jackets to their lone playoff appearance.
For some reason, Columbus fans forget that and focus more on the struggles Mason had in subsequent seasons.
They were chanting, “We want Mason” in the third period.
Scratches
Defensemen Erik Gustafsson and Hal Gill and winger Jay Rosehill were healthy scratches.