Heroics from Owen Tippett lift the Flyers to a road win against the Detroit Red Wings

DETROIT ― Detroit may be known for Motown, but on Saturday night, on national television, it was Motownphilly.

Coming off a dominating win against the Chicago Blackhawks at home, the Flyers went into Little Caesars Arena, continued the trend, and handed the Detroit Red Wings a 5-3 loss.

The Flyers have won two straight, five of their past six, and 11 of the 16 games since the Olympic break.

The Flyers now have 84 points and moved three points back of the Columbus Blue Jackets, who lost to the San Jose Sharks on Saturday, for the second wild card in the Eastern Conference. The Flyers have a game in hand on Columbus.

They are also four points back of the Pittsburgh Penguins for the three-seed in the Metropolitan Division and five points behind the New York Islanders for the two-seed, with a game in hand on Pittsburgh and two on New York. On Saturday, Pittsburgh lost to the Dallas Stars, and New York jumped into second with a win against the Florida Panthers.

Owen Tippett started things off just over four minutes into the game. Detroit defenseman Moritz Seider tried to dangle through the neutral zone but had the puck slide off his stick thanks to pressure from Denver Barkey. It went right to Trevor Zegras, who sent the pass up to Tippett, and away the speedster went. He skated in, blowing past Simon Edvinsson and scoring five-hole on John Gibson.

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In the second period, he extended the lead to 2-0 with another five-hole goal.

Barkey carried the puck through the neutral zone, pushing the Red Wings’ defense of Seider and Edvinsson back as he entered the zone. He dished it to Tippett on his left a few feet into the offensive zone and cut in front of Tippett as Edvinsson went down to one knee to try and block the shot. Instead, the puck went through the legs of Edvinsson and through Gibson.

Later in the middle frame, the Flyers’ power play collected for the third time in 12 games and 35 opportunities.

Noah Cates won the offensive-zone faceoff, and the Flyers got to work. Eventually, Travis Konecny threw the puck on goal, and it deflected off Matvei Michkov sitting near the left post, off the pad of Gibson, and popped in front.

Cates, who was sitting on the right post, jammed it in for his seventh goal and 15 points in the 16 games since the Olympic break. He leads the Flyers in points and is tied with Tippett for the team lead in goals in that stretch. He has also hit a career high in goals with his 17th of the season.

The Red Wings and Flyers traded goals; however, each was wiped away by a coach’s challenge. Seider thought he scored on a power play with under two minutes to go in the second period to make it 3-1, and Christian Dvorak thought he made it 4-0 early in the third.

But Tippett put the game away and completed the hat trick later in the final frame with a beauty of a power-play goal.

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He got the puck in the Flyers’ end, skated through the neutral zone, appeared to pass it to himself to get around Ben Chiarot, before going bar down.

Tippett has 27 goals on the season and 48 points — he added an assist late— putting him one goal shy of his career high set in 2023-24. He has seven goals and 12 points in his past 11 games.

But then the Red Wings mounted a comeback.

Mason Appleton, Alex DeBrincat, and Lucas Raymond scored with under seven minutes left in the third period for the Red Wings before Sean Couturier iced it with a goal in his third straight game as he sent the puck into the empty net with just over two minutes to go.

Defenseman Noah Juulsen and forward Garrett Wilson were healthy scratches. They watched from the press box alongside forward Tyson Foerster, who participated in morning skate. ... Defenseman Cam York played in his 300th NHL game.

The Flyers get right back to it at Xfinity Mobile Arena on Sunday, when they host the Dallas Stars (7 p.m., NBCSP). Dallas defeated the