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Recap: Flyers dominate Hawks in Boisvert’s debut

Originally posted on The Rink | By Andrew Bard | Last updated Mar 27, 2026 12:19 PM ET

The Chicago Blackhawks continued their four-game road trip across the Metropolitan Division with a Thursday night tilt against the Philadelphia Flyers at Xfinity Mobile Arena. The Hawks are coming off a gritty 4-3 win over the New York Islanders at UBS Arena on Tuesday night in a game that marked the debut of Anton Frondell, the team’s first round pick (third overall) in 2025. Thursday’s game featured the debut of another former first-round pick, Sacha Boisvert, who was selected 18th overall in the 2024 draft and was signed out of Boston University following the conclusion of their season. Spencer Knight started for the Hawks against the Flyers’ Samuel Ersson.

First period

The Flyers jumped out to a 1-0 lead just 48 seconds into the game. A miscommunication between Knight and Artyom Levshunov left the puck on the stick of Christian Dvorak, who fed Alex Bump for his third of the season on a wide-open net.

The mistakes by the Hawks continued as Andre Burakovsky made a blind pass that was stolen by Luke Glendening near the half boards, and he fired it toward the net and it was tipped in by Sean Couturier to give the Flyers a 2-0 lead. For Couturier, it was his ninth of the season at 2:33 and it would stay that way through 20 minutes.

Second period

The Flyers took a 3-0 lead when Trevor Zegras skated in and his shot was stopped by Knight but Denver Barkey was there to pounce on the rebound for his fourth of the season at 5:14.

The Hawks finally got on the board as Connor Bedard scored his 30th of the season to cut the deficit to 3-1. In what can be seen as a glimpse into the future, Frondell made a backhand pass across the goal line to Bedard who fired a one-timer past Ersson at 11:11. For Frondell, it was his second point in as many games.

from Frondell, for pic.twitter.com/16SHxahtae

— Chicago Blackhawks (@NHLBlackhawks) March 27, 2026

Noah Cates stretched the Flyers’ lead to 4-1 with his 16th of the season at 12:41. Matvei Michkov won a board battle in the offensive zone and found Cates, who got behind the Hawks defense and skated in alone and beat Knight for the goal.

With 25 seconds left in the second, Dvorak scored his 15th of the season to give the Flyers a 5-1 lead. Levshunov’s nightmare game continued as Owen Tippett forced a turnover and fed Dvorak on the doorstep. The Flyers led by four after two periods.

Third period

There was no scoring in the period as the Flyers won it 5-1.

Analysis

It was a sloppy game for the young Hawks, who were generous with the puck with several giveaways and were unable to climb out of an early 2-0 deficit that seemed to have snowballed into a nightmare. The defense, led by Levshunov, was extremely careless with the puck and the Hawks spent most of the night chasing the puck and generating very little offense. Boisvert made little impact in his debut as he centered the fourth line and received just over nine minutes of ice time. It will be a quick turnaround for the Hawks as they head back up I-95 to New York City for a Friday night contest against the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden. Puck drop is at 6 p.m. CDT on CHSN with the radio call on 720 AM WGN.