An almost-daily look back at how the Philadelphia Flyers have fared on this day, recalling some of the more memorable moments, achievements, and events that shaped the organization throughout the club’s storied history
The Flyers have posted a 10-4-3-2 all-time record in 19 games played on December 9. Philadelphia went 21 years without a loss on this day from 1972-1993, going 6-0-3-0 during that stretch.
1970 — Rookie Bob Kelly snapped a 2-2 tie early in the second period and Doug Favell turned aside 29 of 31 shots as the Flyers went on to record a 5-2 victory over the St. Louis Blues at St. Louis Arena.
Bill Lesuk and Jean-Guy Gendron scored first period goals for the visitors before Kelly’s tie-breaker in the middle frame, and despite being outshot 16-14 in the final stanza, Philadelphia notched the only two goals courtesy of Joe Watson and Serge Bernier. Bernier, who finished the contest with four points, which at that time was a career-best.
1973 — Goals by Orest Kindrachuk, Simon Nolet, and Rick MacLeish staked Bernie Parent and the Flyers to a 3-1 lead late in regulation, but Bobby Orr scored with 1:22 remaining then set up Phil Esposito for the game-tying marker with just 32 seconds left to give the Boston Bruins a stunning 3-3 draw at the Spectrum.
1976 — Gary Dornhoefer posted the game-winning goal and an assist and Bernie Parent stopped 17 of 18 shots to lead the Flyers to a 3-1 triumph over the Boston Bruins at Boston Garden, extending Philadelphia’s unbeaten streak to nine games (6-0-3).
After Wayne Cashman gave the home team a quick lead, Rick MacLeish scored his fourth goal in two games to tie it up just 3:36 later. Dornhoefer tallied on a power play in the latter half of the opening frame, giving the Flyers a lead they would not relinquish.
Bobby Clarke closed out the scoring when he hit the empty net while Philly was basically skating two men shorthanded, as they were killing off a Mel Bridgman minor while Boston pulled goalie Gilles Gilbert for an extra attacker in an attempt to forge a tying goal.
1978 — Rick MacLeish recorded his 10th regular season hat trick and four points and defenseman Bob Dailey added a goal and five points as the Flyers bombarded the Boston Bruins, 9-2, at the Spectrum.
Philadelphia jumped all over Boston starter Gilles Gilbert from the opening faceoff, outshooting Boston 12-2 in the first period and racing to a 4-0 lead thanks to a pair of markers from MacLeish, one from Dailey, and another off the stick of Bobby Clarke.
The Bruins seemed to gain some traction in the middle stanza when they cut their deficit in half on tallies from Peter McNab and Don Marcotte, but Clarke’s second of the contest and Bill Barber’s first late in the session restored the four-goal lead heading into the second intermission.
MacLeish completed his hat trick midway through the third period, before Bob Kelly and Blake Dunlop each tallied to close out the scoring.
1979 — Rookie Brian Propp’s goal with 3:39 remaining in regulation gave the Flyers a 4-3 lead, but Terry Ruskowski tied it up with 50 seconds left as Philadelphia choked away a two-goal lead in the final frame and had to settle for a 4-4 deadlock with the Chicago Blackhawks at the Spectrum.
The tie, however, made it 24 consecutive outings without a loss for the Flyers (17-0-7), who moved to within four games of the all-time record set by the Montreal Canadiens just two seasons earlier.
Despite being badly outplayed and outshot 8-3 in the opening twenty minutes, Philly still found themselves on top 2-0 on the strength of goals from Bob Kelly and Rick MacLeish.
Chicago’s Tim Higgins notched the lone goal of the middle stanza to cut the Flyers’ lead to 2-1, but Mel Bridgman’s goal early in the third made it a two-goal lead at 3-1.
The Blackhawks were able to get even on strikes from defenseman Doug Wilson and Higgins’ second of the contest, before the late goals from Propp and Ruskowski.
Just as Philadelphia had scored on a high percentage of their first period shots on Mike Veisor (2 of 3), Chicago buried three of their four shots on Phil Myre in the final period to salvage a hard-fought point on the road.
1981 — Bill Barber scored a pair of goals, Bobby Clarke added a goal and assist, and Pete Peeters turned away 24 of the 25 shots he faced as the Flyers defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-1 at the Igloo. The win was the fifth in a row for the Orange-and-Black, and seventh in their last eight outings.
Ken Linseman also scored for the Flyers, as the team was in the midst of killing off a first period Paul Holmgren five-minute fighting major that saw him get ejected with a double game-misconduct.
1982 — Ron Flockhart scored twice, Ron Sutter scored his first NHL goal, and Pelle Lindbergh stopped all but one of the 28 shots sent his way in a 4-1 victory over the Quebec Nordiques at the Spectrum.
Paul Holmgren added a goal and an assist for Philadelphia, who won for the first time in three contests (1-1-1).
The 18-year-old Sutter, playing in just his fifth game after being selected fourth-overall in the previous summer’s entry draft, beat Quebec netminder John Garrett 8:50 into the first period to give the Flyers a 2-0 lead. He would make five more appearances before being returned to the Western Hockey League’s Lethbridge Broncos.
1986 — Rick Tocchet scored a goal and assisted on two others and disgruntled backup goaltender Bob Froese made 28 saves in his final Flyers’ appearance as Philadelphia doubled up the Vancouver Canucks 6-3 at the Spectrum.
Ron Sutter and Mark Howe each added a goal and assist, while Pelle Eklund, Scott Mellanby, and Ilkka Sinisalo also lit the lamp for the home club.
Froese, who did not hide his displeasure while serving as second fiddle to rookie sensation Ron Hextall, was excellent in just his third start of the year. Froese was especially good over the final 40 minutes, when the Canucks outshot the Flyers by a wide 24-14 margin. The St. Catherines, Ontario-native felt he should have been the team’s starter following a solid 31-10-3 season after Pelle Lindbergh’s untimely death in a car accident the previous year.
Froese would be traded to the arch-rival New York Rangers in exchange for hulking defenseman Kjell Samuelsson just nine days later, finishing his career in Philly with a fantastic 92-29-12 regular season record.
1989 — Murray Craven scored twice and Mike Bullard posted a Gordie Howe hat trick, but the Quebec Nordiques scored twice within a 16 second-span in the game’s final half minute to finish in a wild 6-6 draw.
Bullard assisted on Pelle Eklund’s first period goal, scored one of his own late in the middle stanza to give the Flyers a 5-3 lead, then drew a fighting major midway through the third period to complete the Gordie Howe feat.
Ron Sutter scored once and added three points, and rookie rear guard Jiri Latal also scored for Philadelphia.
Ken Wregget ended up with 31 saves, but couldn’t hold the late two-goal lead. He yielded a penalty shot goal to Joe Sakic with 23 seconds remaining in regulation to make it a 6-5 Flyers’ lead, then allowed the game-tying tally to Lucien Deblois with just seven ticks left on the clock.
1990 — Pelle Eklund’s power play goal with 4:12 remaining in regulation proved to be the game-winner and Ron Hextall stopped 29 of 33 shots in a 5-4 triumph over the Chicago Blackhawks at Chicago Stadium.
Murray Craven, Mike Ricci, Rick Tocchet, and Derrick Smith also scored for Philadelphia, who beat Ed Belfour five times on just 24 shots.
1999 — Eric Lindros recorded his 11th and final regular season hat trick in a Flyers’ uniform, and John Vanbiesbrouck turned aside 27 of 29 shots to lead Philadelphia past the Toronto Maple Leafs 4-2 at the First Union Center in a battle of the top two Eastern Conference clubs. By virtue of the triumph, Philly leapfrogged the Leafs for the top spot in the conference.
The ‘Big E’ beat Toronto netminder Glenn Healy twice in the first period, ramming home a rebound of a Daymond Langkow shot at 13:35, then deflecting a Mark Recchi shot past the Leafs’ goalie for a power play marker just over four minutes later.
Lindros nearly completed the hat trick in the middle stanza when he hit the post, but did manage to finish off the three-goal performance when he closed out the scoring with a left circle laser that beat Healy top shelf with 1:06 remaining.
Both coaches were impressed — to varying degrees — by Lindros’ performance, as evidenced by their post-game comments:
“I don’t know about dominance, but he had a heck of a game. He’s a big, strong guy, and he’s got skill on top of it.” — Leafs’ head coach Pat Quinn
“Eric was the dominating force out there. He was hitting, scoring a power play goal, killing penalties, taking faceoffs. He did it all tonight. So when your captain does that, it’s great for the team.” — Flyers’ head coach Roger Neilson
John LeClair added a goal and an assist, while Recchi finished with a pair of helpers to extend his point-scoring streak to eight games, which included four goals and 13 points during that stretch.
2006 — Despite a pair of goals and three points from Simon Gagne, Philadelphia’s nightmare campaign continues with a 5-3 defeat at the hands of the Washington Capitals at the Wachovia Center, giving the Flyers an atrocious 8-17-4 season mark.
2008 — Simon Gagne’s power play goal with 8:58 remaining in regulation broke a 3-3 tie and Martin Biron made 24 saves as the Flyers erased a two-goal deficit to pull out a 4-3 victory over the New York Islanders at the Wachovia Center.
The visitors took a 2-0 lead with a pair of goals midway through the opening frame from Andy Hilbert and Doug Weight in a 1:01 span, but Philadelphia got one back before the first intermission from Arron Asham.
The Flyers dominated the middle session by a 10-5 shot count and took the lead by scoring the only two markers of the period. Darroll Powe knotted the contest with his first NHL tally midway through the stanza, and Jeff Carter hit the 20-goal mark late in the period to give Philadelphia the lead.
But the Isles came out with fire in their eyes in the third and tied the game on an early Blake Comeau marker, setting up Gagne’s late-game heroics.
Mike Richards set up two Philly goals, including the primary assist on Gagne’s game-winner.
2010 — Danny Briere scored twice and Brian Boucher stopped 31 of 32 shots as the Flyers skated to a 4-1 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs at Air Canada Centre.
Ville Leino and Chris Pronger also scored for Philadelphia, who won for the third time in four outings.
The big game gave Briere, who also assisted on Pronger’s goal, four goals and five points over that same four-game span, and a team-leading 16 goals for the season.
2013 — Michael Raffl recorded his first NHL goal and Kimmo Timonen tied the game up midway through the third period, but Jason Spezza managed to beat Steve Mason for the lone goal in the third round of the dreaded shootout to lift the Ottawa Senators to a 5-4 victory over the Flyers at Canadian Tire Centre.
2014 — Brayden Schenn scored the game-tying marker with 55.3 seconds remaining in regulation, but Kevin Connauton netted the game-winner at 1:58 of overtime to give the Columbus Blue Jackets a 3-2 triumph at Nationwide Arena.
December 6 Flyers’ birthday
Petr Nedved, who was acquired from the Phoenix Coyotes in exchange for young defender Dennis Seidenberg in January of 2006, was born on this day in Liberec, Czechoslovakia in 1971. In 49 regular season games over parts of two seasons in Philly, the Vancouver Canucks’ second-overall selection in the 1990 draft posted six goals, 21 points, a -28 rating, and 54 PIMs. Nedved notched a pair of goals and eight PIMs in six postseason contests.
In Memorium
Andrei Lomakin, the first Russian player ever to skate for the Flyers, passed away on this day in 2006 following a long battle with cancer. The native of Voskresensk, Union of Soviet Socialist Republic was only 42 years old. Drafted in the seventh round (138th-overall) by Philadelphia in the 1991 draft, Lomakin recorded 22 goals, 50 points, and 60 PIMs in 108 games over the course of two seasons. He was left unprotected for the 1993 expansion draft, and was the ninth forward selected by the Florida Panthers.
