Flyers-Kings observations: The reclamation of Ivan Provorov continues

Observations from the Flyers’ 3-2 shootout loss to Los Angeles on Thursday:

For the fifth time in their history, the Flyers finished a game without committing a penalty. Two have come this season. They did not commit a penalty in a Nov. 24 game in Toronto.

They were shut out in that game, 6-0.

This does not seem to be their formula for success.

The reclamation of Ivan Provorov continued Thursday as the Flyers defenseman logged 28:02 of ice time, broke up a slew of dangerous looking entries and even led the Flyers in shots on goal with five — his season high.

If there’s been some breakthrough, he’s not telling. Gordon has joked that a bye-week sunburn in which he "peeled some skin" is responsible, and maybe he’s speaking figuratively.

Hard to believe a week off could do so much for someone. Then again, he plays almost half of most games, and they are, to quote his ex-head coach, “heavy minutes.”

The Flyers did something against Jonathan Quick that they rarely do: score a second goal.

It was just the second time in 14 career games against them that the Flyers have scored twice. They have never scored three times. He has won his last five starts against them.

Flyers coach Scott Gordon had warned his team about playing into Los Angeles “lullabye” trap, but that’s precisely what they did anyway in the first period.

“They kind of invited us, baited us, to go in to the middle and then they converge on us in the middle,” said Shayne Gostisbehere. “I mean, that’s their style. They want you to make plays at the offensive blue line, they force turnovers to come down.”

"They pretty much played to get four guys between the red and the blue line and if you’re coming pace and you’re ideally trying to play above their second layer," said Gordon. "It makes it harder for them to defend and we didn’t do enough of that consistently.

"We didn’t identify the opportunities to advance to the puck before they could even get set up into their forecheck, and as a result a lot of times we were looking up and we didn’t have the support. So if we passed the puck up to where he deflected it in the guy was supposed to go in on the forecheck was too far away from the puck where it went it. There were a lot of things, but you fall into that mode sometimes thinking you’ve got a lot of time because they don’t pressure down the ice as much as maybe some other teams, and it’s not that it’s impossible to penetrate that situation, but you’ve got to be smarter and not beat yourself with it."

A true sign of how much duress Antony Stolarz was under, especially early, was how often his flailing stick had to be retrieved from the corner and behind his net. With his 6-6 wing span, Stolarz uses his stick as a sort of extra defenseman when opponents try to emerge from behind his net. He even had one of his twigs snapped when a Kings player cut it in half on an unsuccessful skate out.

"That’s part of my game," he said. "More times than not it helps me."

One time it did not was on Adrien Kempe’s shootout goal. Stolarz tried to surprise him but missed with the poke.