Flyers sloppy in return from break

THE CONSENSUS among Flyers players was that it would take maybe a period of play to get out any of the cobwebs that grew during the 3-week Olympic break. They were right. Sort of.

It was the Sharks who needed 20 minutes to shake off the rust, because in the second period San Jose took advantage of numerous Flyers mistakes - some forced, many not - and rolled to a 7-3 win last night at the Wells Fargo Center.

The only thing that went right for the Flyers in the second stanza was the horn sounding that ended it.

"A couple simple penalties, turnovers that led to odd-man rushes and we were soft in front of our own net," said Scott Hartnell, a minus-3 on the night. "That's what you're going to get when you don't play tough . . . it could have been 10-3."

Joe Pavelski had a hat trick in the second period. Hartnell took a delay-of-game penalty for knocking off the Flyers' own net while on the power play. The sloppy giveaways, like the Nick Grossmann clearing pass that ended up being Pavelski's second goal, were numerous.

Goalie Steve Mason was yanked after allowing four goals on 13 shots in less than 31 minutes. When Ray Emery gave up three more (and had a fourth disallowed), Mason went back in.

Afterward, Flyers coach Craig Berube said only that Emery had "an issue. Something was bothering him. So I just made the switch."

The five San Jose goals tied the season high for a Flyers opponent in a period. The seven tied for most allowed at home this year. The fans came to see if the Flyers could extend their four-game winning streak. Instead, a Sixers-Bucks game broke out.

"We're pretty disgusted with the way that we played," Mason said. "We had a full week of practice to make sure we were ready for this. I thought our effort was pretty crappy overall."

If Pavelski had clicked like this over in Russia, the United States might have come home with an Olympic medal. He played with Toronto's James van Riemsdyk (remember him?) and Phil Kessel on a line that was scorching in the early games. The whole team stopped scoring in the medal round and the Americans came home with nyet.

Pavelski and Kessel are tied with 32 goals. Only Alexander Ovechkin (41) has more.

The only Flyer to pick up a medal over in Sochi was defenseman Kimmo Timonen. He did not play last night, which turned out to be a blessing with consecutive games coming up against Metro Division opponents. The Flyers will have Timonen when they host the Rangers tomorrow and visit Washington on Sunday.

Timonen, 38, was given the night off after playing six games in Russia, which is something baseball managers do with aging outfielders. And supposedly they are thinking of trading defenseman Andrej Meszaros? Yikes.

"If we get Kimmo for the long run," it's going to help, said Flyers captain Claude Giroux. "Any time you [play] in a tournament like that, it's going to take a lot out of you."

Meszaros had one of the goals last night, his fourth in his last nine games. Brayden Schenn's goal made it 2-1 Flyers, but then San Jose scored the next six.

"It looked like we stopped competing after they tied the game up," Berube said. "We didn't compete hard enough to win the hockey game. Nobody [did]."

The Sharks are one of the better teams in the Western Conference, but that's no excuse for the Flyers to play so lazily in the final two periods. The ultimate skate to the crotch came when the Sharks' fourth-liners scored with 2.2 seconds left in the second period to give San Jose a 6-2 lead.

The goal was scored by Raffi Torres, who was playing for the first time all season after missing 59 games with a knee injury. Torres is best known for being a borderline savage. His last two playoff seasons were ended by the league's office with suspensions for illegal checks to the head.

Logan Couture, who had missed the Sharks' final 16 games heading into the break because of hand surgery, also scored twice. Couture would have had a hat trick, but a potential third goal was disallowed after a painful, 7-minute delay for video replay.

The Flyers beat San Jose right before the Olympic break in one of their better games of the season. Last night was the complete opposite.

"We got away from what we're supposed to do," said Giroux, a minus-2 on the night. "When we don't do what we're supposed to do, that's when we get in trouble. Obviously, the second period was kind of a disaster."