You never know who the hero will be on a given night of hockey. Making history isn’t easy within the storied contexts of the Detroit Red Wings and Philadelphia Flyers, who have both rostered numerous Hall of Famers and had lengthy periods as the NHL’s best of the best.
Yet there was a performance on Thursday night that matched or exceeded the efforts of some of the best you can see. A 4-1 Flyers win over the Red Wings wouldn’t have been surprising entering the night. The Flyers had just dismantled the Columbus Blue Jackets in a complete win on Tuesday, and Detroit is firmly a bottom-10 goal-scoring team this season. But it was especially noteworthy that all four Flyers goals belonged to the same player — and a universally respected one within the club in Scott Laughton at that.
Game Recap
Detroit had some jump early, testing Philadelphia rookie netminder Aleksei Kolosov four times in the game’s first four minutes. That was followed by a 13-minute drought without a shot on goal, although the Flyers didn’t truly dominate during that interval. It was a fast and fairly low-event first period that unsurprisingly ended without a goal.
The second period started similarly, but the Flyers started to level up after an early surge from Detroit this time. If not for three fantastic Cam Talbot saves on a Matvei Michkov one-timer, Joel Farabee 2-on-1 shot and Sean Couturier breakaway, the Flyers would have broken the deadlock earlier than 33 minutes into the game. Eventually, the dam burst on a second Philadelphia breakaway, with Laughton over-powering Talbot with a bar-down slap shot.
The Red Wings were fortunate to be within a goal at the second intermission, as the Flyers outshot them 17-8 during the middle period. But despite an early third-period power play, the deficit grew on another goal by Laughton, this one a cross-crease shortie set up by Travis Konecny. The Flyers were the NHL’s leader in shorthanded goals last season (16) but had only one in 2024-25 entering tonight, which happened in their second game on a goal from Konecny set up by Laughton. Exactly two months later, the two traded roles, putting the Flyers ahead 2-0, while also getting Laughton to the 100 career goals milestone.
Detroit did make a late push, forcing Kolosov to make a couple of big saves before Ben Chiarot finally got one past him with 3:53 remaining. Two great chances to tie in the next minute both stayed out, with Alex DeBrincat missing the net on a breakaway and Kolsoov copying former Flyer Talbot’s save on Michkov by robbing another former Flyer in Erik Gustafsson. Another great Kolosov stop on a deflection preserved the lead, and Laughton officially made it his night by depositing the empty-net goal. It was Laughton’s second career hat trick and first since Feb. 7, 2021, against the Washington Capitals.
However, Laughton didn’t stop there. Despite trying to give the puck to teammate Garnet Hathaway on a 2-on-0 with the net once again empty, he was the one who slid the puck home. The second-longest tenured Flyer tied a franchise record with four goals, the first to do so since John LeClair on Oct. 15, 2002, against the Montreal Canadiens. He has 12 goals in his last 11 games against the Red Wings.
