There were lots of reasons why the Flyers evened their Eastern Conference quarterfinals and took away the home-ice advantage with Friday’s 5-1 victory in Pittsburgh.
At the top of the list, quite surprisingly, was the Flyers’ special-teams’ domination in Game 2.
The Flyers were 2 for 3 on the power play – getting goals from Shayne Gostisbehere and Nolan Patrick – and 4 for 4 on their much-maligned penalty kill, which got a break when Sidney Crosby missed a wide-open net at the end of the second period.
“I think we frustrated them on their first couple power plays,” said Matt Read, who has keyed the penalty killers improvement over the last two-plus months, after Saturday’s optional practice in Voorhees.