Flyers Finally Win One: Martone and Michkov Lift Philadelphia Past Ottawa 3-1

It took until the middle of October, and it took a second period in which two young forwards traded goals and assists until a scoreless game turned in their favour, but the Philadelphia Flyers finally have a win. Philadelphia beat the Ottawa Senators 3-1 on Saturday, October 17, 2026 at Xfinity Mobile Arena in Philadelphia, according to the Field Level Media report, ending a nine-game wait for a first victory of the season. The Flyers entered the night without a win. They left it at 1-6-3. Ottawa, who had arrived with the far healthier record, fell to 6-3-0.

A first win does not repair a start like 0-6-3, and nobody in Philadelphia should pretend that one Saturday night does. What it does is stop the count. Every day a team spends winless in October, the schedule stops looking like a list of opponents and starts looking like a verdict. The Flyers now have a different conversation to have — about a young pairing who produced when the game was still there to be taken, about a goaltender who matched his counterpart save for save, and about a third period in which they protected a lead instead of watching one disappear. For more coverage across the league, see Previously's sports front.

A scoreless first, then Batherson breaks through

The first period produced no goals, which, given the Flyers' season so far, was its own kind of tension. A team waiting for a first win does not get to treat a 0-0 period as neutral for long, because the longer the wait goes on inside a single game, the more it connects to the longer wait behind it. Philadelphia got through the opening 20 minutes level, and that mattered, because it kept the night from becoming another early chase.

Ottawa struck first in the second. Drake Batherson put the Senators ahead at 5:55 of the second period, finishing a two-on-one rush with Claude Giroux, according to the game report. For a team with Ottawa's record — they would leave Philadelphia at 6-3-0 — that is exactly the kind of moment that usually settles a favourite and presses on a struggling home side. A two-on-one finished cleanly, early in the middle period, against a team who have not yet won: the script from there writes itself in most Octobers. Philadelphia, to their credit, did not follow it.

Martone and Michkov turn the second period

The response came from the pairing who will define what this Flyers season can still become. Porter Martone tied the game 1-1 at 9:03 of the second period, redirecting a Matvei Michkov setup, according to NHL scoring data. Less than 10 minutes later, the same two players combined again, this time on the power play. At 18:33 of the second, Michkov converted the rebound of a Martone shot for a 2-1 lead. Each player finished the night with a goal and an assist, and between them they produced both the equaliser and the winner in the same period.

There is a reason that detail matters more than the bare scoreline. Struggling teams often get their first win from a deflection, a goaltender stealing a game, or an opponent having an off night, and they take it gratefully. Philadelphia got theirs from the connection they most need to grow. Martone redirecting a Michkov setup is one kind of chemistry — a finisher reading a playmaker. Michkov following a Martone shot to its rebound on the power play is another — a playmaker reading where a shooter's effort will end up. Two goals, two different shapes, the same two names on both scoresheets. That is a bright spot with structure to it, not just a good shift that happened to end in a goal.

The power-play timing mattered too. Converting at 18:33, late in the second period, sent Philadelphia into the intermission ahead instead of level, and sent Ottawa into the room knowing their lead had not just gone but inverted. Teams protecting a first win of the season are rarely calm in a third period. Teams protecting a lead they built themselves, through their best young players, have at least something concrete to hold on to.

Vladar holds the third, Zegras closes it

Ottawa pressed in the third period, including a late power play, but could not beat Dan Vladar again, according to the report. Vladar made 25 saves for Philadelphia. At the other end, Linus Ullmark also made 25 saves for Ottawa, a symmetry that underlines how much of this game was decided not by volume but by the second-period sequence in which Martone and Michkov scored twice on the chances that counted.

Twenty-five saves will not lead highlight packages, and it does not need to. For a goaltender behind a team who started 0-6-3, the job in a game like this is specific and unforgiving: do not give the lead back cheaply, especially when the opposition get a late power play and the building starts to think about everything that has gone wrong before. Vladar did that job. Ottawa's pressure produced no second goal, and the longer the third period stayed 2-1, the more the night tilted from whether Philadelphia would find a way to lose toward whether they would find a way to finish.

Trevor Zegras provided the finish. Zegras scored into an empty net with 14 seconds remaining to seal the 3-1 result. Empty-net goals rarely get much respect in a recap, but in context this one did real work: it removed the last 14 seconds of jeopardy from a night that had carried nine games' worth of it. There would be no late equaliser, no overtime, no new entry in a list Philadelphia are trying to stop writing. The puck went in, the wait ended, and the Flyers had a win to take into the rest of October.

What a first win in mid-October does — and does not — change

The honest reading starts with the records. Philadelphia improved to 1-6-3. Ottawa fell to 6-3-0. One team leaves this game with work still piled in front of it; the other leaves with a loss that does not change the basic shape of a strong start. The Flyers have not climbed out of the hole their opening weeks dug. They have put a first foothold on its wall.

Schedule pressure is the part that does not show up in a box score. A winless run stretching toward 10 games changes how every practice, every travel day and every home game feels, because the next opponent is never just the next opponent — it is also the next chance for the streak to end, and the next chance for it to get worse. Beating a 6-3-0 Ottawa team, rather than catching a weaker side on a bad night, gives Philadelphia a result they do not have to qualify. They fell behind to a good team, answered within the same period, took the lead on the power play, protected it through a pressed third period including a late Ottawa power play, and closed it with an empty-net goal. That is a complete template for how this team can win games, written in one night.

The Martone-Michkov connection is the other takeaway that will travel. Young players on rebuilding or retooling teams are often described as bright spots in the abstract — energy here, a flash there. What happened on Saturday was more specific. Michkov set up Martone to tie the game. Martone's shot created the rebound Michkov converted to win it. Each finished with a goal and an assist. If Philadelphia are going to turn 1-6-3 into something less damaging over the coming weeks, it will most likely be because that pairing keeps producing in exactly this way, and because Vladar keeps giving them close games to produce in.

None of that is a promise, and this recap will not dress it up as one. The Flyers still have six regulation losses and three more beyond regulation on their record, and one win over Ottawa does not move Ottawa's season or erase Philadelphia's start. But seasons turn on nights when a team finally stops a slide before it becomes the whole story. On Saturday at Xfinity Mobile Arena, with Batherson's opener answered by Martone, with Michkov's power-play rebound standing up as the winner, with Vladar's 25 saves holding through a late Ottawa push and Zegras hitting the empty net with 14 seconds left, the Flyers gave themselves that kind of night. Previously will follow what they do with it on the sports desk, alongside the rest of the weekend's results, including the football fallout in the Rewind on Everton's loss to Chelsea.