RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Logan Stankoven scored twice to continue his postseason tear and the Carolina Hurricanes smothered the Philadelphia Flyers in a 3-0 victory Saturday night to open the second-round series.
Jackson Blake also scored for Carolina, and Frederik Andersen stopped 18 shots for his second shutout of these playoffs and seventh in his postseason career.
Game 2 of the series is Monday night in Raleigh.
Carolina never trailed in closing a first-round
sweep of Ottawa last weekend, then had an extended break while the Flyers battled to push past Pittsburgh in overtime of Game 6 on Wednesday night. That led to rest-versus-rust conversations about how the the Eastern Conference's top seed would start Saturday night.
Instead, the Hurricanes pounced from the opening puck drop, a departure from how all four regular-season meetings went to overtime or a shootout.
Stankoven scored in each of the four wins against the Senators, then scored on a redirect from the slot just 1:31 in. Blake followed at 7:30, splitting two defenders as he entered the zone and charging in to slip a puck behind Dan Vladar.
That was more than enough offense on this night with the Flyers struggling to apply much pressure on Andersen.
Philadelphia started its first postseason since 2020 by battling through Pittsburgh to close out a six-game series in overtime on Cam York's Wednesday night winner. But they sputtered from the start, managing just nine shots on goal through two periods and being outshot 3-0 on their four power plays on the night.
By the final 10 minutes, the game had turned testy with platers having to be separated multiple times. That included 10-minute misconduct penalties on Philadelphia's Trevor Zegras and Nick Seeler, along with Blake and Shayne Gostisbehere for Carolina.
Both teams were down key players. The Flyers didn't have regular-season goals leader Owen Tippett because of an undisclosed injury, while the Hurricanes were missing defenseman Alexander Nikishin after he suffered a concussion in Game 4 against Ottawa.
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AP NHL playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://apnews.com/hub/nhl
