Myers’ goal lifts Flyers to OT win

Phillippe Myers scored 2:40 into overtime to give the Flyers a 4-3 victory over the Islanders 4-3 on Wednesday in Toronota, tying the Eastern Conference semifinal series at a game apiece.

The Islanders overall a 3-0 first-period deficit, with Jean-Gabriel Pageau getting the tying goal with 2:09 left in regulation.

Myers ended it quickly, connecting on a shot from the right point that glanced off the stick of the Islanders’ Anders Lee on the way in.

Kevin Hayes scored twice in the first period for the Flyers, Sean Couturier also had a goal, and Carter Hart made 31 saves.

Lee and Anthony Beauvillier also scored for the Islanders. Semyon Varlamov had seven saves before he was benched late in the first period. Thomas Greiss finished with 20 stops the rest of the way.

The Flyers scored three times in the first 15:09, chasing Varlamov. He had shut them out in Game 1 and built an Islanders’ playoff record shutout streak of 138:17 before Philadelphia broke through in the first period.

Game 3 is Thursday night.

The Flyers, the top seed in the East, sorely needed more production from their top goal-scorers and finally got it.

Hayes scored off a rush with a wrister from the left circle that rattled in off the post 1:57 into the game. Hayes got his second when he beat Varlamov with a sharpangle shot from the left at 9:43.

Couturier followed later in the period with a slick one, picking up the puck in the neutral zone, slipping around defenseman Nick Leddy and deking Varlamov. That’s when Greiss was sent in to make his playoff debut in relief of Varlamov.

The momentum started to even out in the second period. With the sixth-seeded Islanders on a power play, Lee tipped in a beautiful cross-ice feed from Mathew Barzal to get his team on the board.

Beauvillier made it a one-goal game on a rush 11:11 into the third period. Pageau lifted a wrist shot over Hart’s glove to tie the game with 2:09 left, despite a Flyers’ claim that the Islanders were offside entering the zone.

Lightning turn power on: Ondrej Palat, Mikhail Sergachez and Alex Killorn scored power-play goals to lead the second-seeded Lightning to a 7-1 rout of the fourth-seeded Bruins in Game 3 of their Eastern Conference series.

Killorn added a second goal and Yanni Gourde, Brayden Point and Nikita Kucherov also scored for the Lightning, who won for the second straight night to take a 2-1 lead in the matchup between Atlantic Division rivals.

Kucherov assisted on all three power-play goals as the Lightning ended an 0-for-16 drought in manadvantage situations that began in Game 1 of their first-round victory over the Blue Jackets.

Brad Marchand had his fourth goal of the series for the Bruins, scoring on the power play at 4:56 of the second period.

But by then, the Bruins trailed 3-0.