Netting the all-important opening goal on the road, Gustav Forsling broke the ice for the Panthers when he flicked a wrist shot from the point that caught just a piece of Carter Hart before slowly trickling across the goal line to make it 1-0 a mere 3:41 into the first period.
Tying things up for the Flyers, Tony DeAngleo teed up a pass from Travis Konecny and blasted a heavy one-timer past Sergei Bobrovsky from the bottom of the left circle to make it 1-1 at 6:41.
Getting in on the trend of defensemen finding the back of the net, Josh Mahura put the Panthers right back on top when he chased down a rebound following a shot from Radko Gudas and beat Hart short-side from a very sharp angle near the bottom of the left circle to make it 2-1 at 7:58.
Making it 2-2, Scott Laughton cashed in on the power play at 15:28.
Striking twice within a span of 1:12, the Flyers took the lead when Zach MacEwen tipped a point shot from Nick Seeler past Bobrovsky to make it 3-2 at 10:17. After that, Joel Farabee, cleaning up after Bobrovsky had stopped Kevin Hayes on a breakaway, scored to make it 4-2 at 11:29.
"I think 5-on-5 we were the better team," Panthers forward Carter Verhaeghe said. "It was just a couple of breakdowns that led to goals. We can't give up that big of a lead in the NHL. They're a good team, too. They're going to defend well. Overall, we had good chances."
Ending a drought on the power pay, the Panthers finally broke through with the extra attacker when Brandon Montour -- you guessed it, another defenseman -- backhanded a juicy rebound over a sprawled-out Hart to trim the deficit down to 4-3 just 36 seconds into the third period.
Both of Montour's goals this season have come on the power play.
"I thought we had some good looks," Montour said of the man advantage. "Clean looks. I'd like us to be a little quicker still. We're still trying to make a little too perfect of plays. We've got some good shooters. It was nice to get one there early in the third, but still a lot to work on there."
Throwing everything they could at Philadelphia's net as time ticked away, the Panthers led the Flyers 45-9 in shot attempts -- including 11 from high-danger areas -- and 24-3 in scoring chances over the final 20 minutes of regulation, but simply couldn't find the game-tying goal before the final horn sounded.
Improving to 5-0-0, Hart's 48 saves were a career-high.
"There's a couple of things we have to fix, but they didn't relate to pucks in our net," Maurice said. "It's all mentality. It's all mindset. We slowed slightly. We didn't get outplayed at that point, but we came off it slightly just trying to find a different way to do it, but then we got right back on it in the third. It's a tough loss, but well played."
