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PHILADELPHIA (Ticker) -- It did not take long for the Philadelphia Flyers to get under the skin of Toronto Maple Leafs goaltender Ed Belfour .

Defenseman Marcus Ragnarsson scored the go-ahead goal in the second period and Robert Esche stopped 23 shots as the Flyers defeated the Maple Leafs , 3-1, in the opener of their Eastern Conference semifinal series.

Belfour recorded three shutouts in the opening round and yielded just 11 goals in a seven-game victory over the Ottawa Senators . But he lost his cool late in the third period of Game One of this series, delivering a one-handed slash to Branko Radivojevic after the two tangled in the left corner.

"It was just a reaction," said Belfour, who made 23 saves. "They put some guys in the crease. I think we knew that was going to be their game plan."

No one should know Belfour better than Flyers coach Ken Hitchcock, who coached him for five seasons in Dallas.

"I have no idea (how to get to him)," Hitchcock said. "When I coached him, he stopped everything, so I have no idea. He may be playing the best of anybody in the world right now in that position, so we have to find a way."

By the time Belfour was penalized for slashing, the Flyers had a comfortable two-goal lead en route to their third straight win.

"There was a lot of infringement on him and he's a competitive guy," Toronto coach Pat Quinn said of his goaltender. "If he's not protected in a lot of ways, he feels he has to protect himself."

Ragnarsson ended a 19-game playoff drought at 5:11 of the second period. A hit by Mark Recchi on Joe Nieuwendyk allowed the puck to come back to the left point, where Ragnarsson wristed a shot that handcuffed Belfour and beat him to the glove side.

"Maybe you don't expect to score from just inside the blue line, but you put it to the net and you get rebounds or whatever," Ragnarsson said. "I'll try to do more of that. I got a good shot off and fortunately, it went through."

"It was just one of those things that happens," Belfour said. "It was a bit of a bad break for us, but it was good for them."

Simon Gagne added an insurance tally with 4:25 to go in the third for Philadelphia, which hosts Game Two on Sunday.

Coming off a grueling series with Ottawa, the Maple Leafs were outshot in the first period, 11-3. But they came away with a 1-1 tie after Alexander Mogilny 's centering pass hit the skate of Flyers defenseman Mattias Timander and caromed past Esche.

"It is a factor, but when you are out there, you are not worried about how fatigued you are. You are just trying to play," Toronto defenseman Ken Klee said. "I don't know if they had fresher legs. They just got the bounce on the point shot and we didn't."

The Flyers struck first at 7:14 of the opening period when Tony Amonte poked the rebound of Jeremy Roenick 's shot past Belfour for his second playoff goal.

"We expected them to come at us pretty hard," Maple Leafs defenseman Bryan McCabe said. "I thought we weathered the storm. We got one back and came in the locker room, 1-1."

Toronto had a 12-8 edge in shots in the second, but Ragnarsson scored the only goal of the period.

"We had a good first period, but it took until halfway through the second period before we started to play with any kind of jump," Flyers captain Keith Primeau said. "We weren't jumping on loose pucks like we did in the New Jersey series."