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Hart shines again as Flyers win fourth straight

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Carter Hart made 31 saves as the Flyers defeated the Jets in Philadelphia to win their fourth straight.

The Philadelphia Flyers are certainly embracing their role of spoiler.

Four wins on the trot, all against teams either firmly entrenched in either a playoff spot or at least in the hunt. Not bad for a team that’s 12 points away from the promised land themselves, with the slimmest of hopes of crawling back at this point.

Still, the Flyers proved to be giant killers once again on Monday, edging out the Winnipeg Jets 3-1 on NBCSN.

The Flyers have now beaten the Minnesota Wild (7-4), the Boston Bruins (4-3), the Montreal Canadiens (5-2) and now the top team in the Central Division.

The mantra for the Jets heading into Monday’s game against the Philadelphia Flyers was to do everything different than they did coming out of the Christmas Break.

It was then, after some time off, that the Jets dropped a 4-1 decision in a less than stellar game against the Calgary Flames. The idea, after the Jets mandated week off plus the all-star break, was not to repeat that performance.

The Jets elected to run out Laurent Brossoit, their exceptional backup goalie that came into the game with a 10-1-1 record with a .943 save percentage.

The only real way to beat him, it seems, has been to find a second or third chance. Such was the case on Philly’s opening goal.

Carter Hart is reportedly staying with the Flyers for the rest of the season. And there’s a good reason for it. He’s a good goalie playing in Philly -- a rarity.

Hart has been in goal for each of Philly’s last four wins and has five Ws in his past six starts. If the Flyers play their cards right and build around Hart, they might just have something.

For now, they’ll take his 31-save performance.

The Jets, meanwhile, have three goals in their past two games. Their loss to the Dallas Stars prior to their week off came after wins against Nashville and Vegas, so it wasn’t all that surprising there was a bit of a let off. Ditto for this one, where the Jets hadn’t played in over a week and it showed.


Scott Billeck is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @scottbilleck