Jagr, Hartnell Open Accounts as Flyers Beat Leafs, But Pronger Hurt

Share

Entering Monday night's tilt with the Toronto Maple Leafs, two Flyers were notably goalless on the season. Both got off the schneid, with Scott Hartnell and Jaromir Jagr each tallying a brace to send the Flyers to a 4-2 victory.

Lavvy skated the two together on a line with Claude Giroux, and the group dominated the Leafs' defense, narrowly missing on some other opportunities in addition to their four goals. Jagr's tallies each came on breakaways, and both were just gorgeous, vintage 68. Harts crashed the net for his first, pushing home a nice feed from Danny Briere. His second came on a great backhand pass from Giroux, and Harts put a brilliant snap one-timer up under the crossbar.

Unfortunately, the celebration is tempered by a scary eye injury to Chris Pronger. [Update below]

Video of all the gorgeous-goal highlights below, plus some notes in brief.

Notes:
Sergei Bobrovsky, getting the start for a frustrated Ilya Bryzgalov, turned in a great performance to best his backup counterpart, Jonas Gustavsson. Both goalies made some huge saves under pressure. Bob didn't have a chance on either goal, both coming off some junky bounces.

Briere's assist was his 600th NHL point. Hartnell scored two goals for the 22nd time in his career; Jagr did so for the 114th time in his.

Read what Flyers Goal Scored By wrote earlier today about Hartnell…

Jagr narrowly missed a third goal, also on a clean breakaway. The Monster came up with a great save to stop it though.

Phil Kessel is a machine, potting his ninth goal in eight games.

High sticks were en vogue tonight, with Toronto whacking away at Flyer faces seemingly at will. It cost them a few power plays, but it cost the Flyers Pronger. Hard to fault Mikhail Grobovski as his follow-through on a shot got into Pronger's eye though. Somewhat surprising there weren't a few gloves thrown down with all the stick work.

If you haven't seen it yet, here's video of Pronger getting hit in the face. His screaming is indicative of just how bad the pain was. Howard Eskin reports he could be out up to two weeks. Right now we're just hoping he doesn't lose any vision. 

UPDATE: Paul Holmgren is hoping
Pronger can re-join the team in the next 10 days to 2 weeks in a skating capacity. He has a
lot of swelling around his eye, and he'll be on bed rest for 4 days.
He lost some vision temporarily but is said to have regained it. Homer also said, "When Chris comes back, he'll be wearing a visor."

Photo: Eric Hartline-US PRESSWIRE

Contact Us