Flyers’ Tony DeAngelo: ‘They Outplayed Us from Start to Finish’

This is not earth-shattering news: The Tampa Bay Lighting are a much stronger team than the Philadelphia Flyers in all areas.

You know it. I know it. The Flyers know it.

So if the Flyers are going to be competitive with the talented Bolts, they must outwork them and be an opportunistic team.

They did neither Thursday in a 4-1 spanking from the Lightning. The Flyers failed to build off Tuesday’s  3-1 win over the New York Islanders, a victory that snapped their 10-game losing streak.

Now they have lost 10 of their last 11.

Even the return of Travis Konecny (goal, seven shot attempts) and Tony DeAngelo (assist, three shots on goal, two blocks) failed to give the Flyers any life. They were listless and outworked from the start.

“Not many positives from tonight,” DeAngelo said. “To be honest with you, it wasn’t a good game all around. They outplayed us from start to finish.”

The Lightning controlled the faceoff circle by winning 65 percent of the draws. They outscored the Flyers (1-0) on special teams. Tampa had a 17-2 shots domination in the second, and outscored Philly in that session, 2-0.

Long night

Tampa generally spent most of the night in the Flyers’ zone before a meaningless third period. In the last stanza Philly came to life (relatively speaking), but Tampa already had a 4-0 lead and was on cruise control.

“We played all right in the third period,” DeAngelo said. “But a lot of times you play decent in the third period just because they’re going to chip pucks out, chip them in and just kind of kill some clock. I feel like we play a little bit looser in our thirds or when we’re trailing. I guess you should say, not even just our thirds, which is maybe something we should try to do all the time.”

The Philadelphia Flyers’ next game is Saturday, a home matchup against the sizzling Devils, who will be trying to avenge an opening-night loss to the Flyers. New Jersey is on a 16-1-1 run, and will be in a foul mood after blowing a late lead Thursday and falling to Nashville in overtime, 4-3.

“We have to move on and put this one in the past,” defenseman Nick Seeler said after the loss to the Lightning. “Learn from the mistakes and the effort in the second. Look to Saturday.”

Breakaways

Kieffer Bellows cleared waivers Friday and was sent to the Phantoms. … DeAngelo was on the second pairing with Travis Sanheim. For the second straight game, Rasmus Ristolainen was with Ivan Provorov. …Justin Braun and Patrick Brown were healthy scratches.

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