Flyers vs Sharks preview: Wake me up when the season ends

So...are any of us even mentally or physically ready to watch another Flyers game?

in narrator’s voice: they weren’t

After a demoralizing 5-4 OT loss to Pittsburgh last night, the Flyers look to finally end this eight game losing streak against the San Jose Sharks. San Jose enters tonight’s contest 5-3-2 in their last 10 games and riding high off a 4-0 shutout of the Winnipeg Jets. That game occurred Black Friday, so not only are the Flyers facing a team riding a hot streak: they’re in the second half of a back-to-back facing a well rested team. Thank you, NHL.

If you remember a simpler, funner time, the Flyers faced the Sharks to open the 2017-2018 season and believe it or not actually won that hockey game. Remember your hockey team winning games? Me neither.

PHI Point Leaders

1. Jakub Voracek - 29 points
2. Claude Giroux - 27 points
3. Sean Couturier - 26 points

SJS Point Leaders

1. Logan Couture - 19 points
2. Thomas Hertl - 14 points
3. Joe Thornton - 14 points

Can they bounce back?

Every loss from this eight game skid has stung, but I don’t think any of the other seven compare to the voodoo we saw last night. The Flyers absolutely dominated the second period en route to a 3-1 lead with just 20 minutes to play...and you know the rest of the story. It’s hard to say this is a must win game, but at this point I think every game is must win until this streak ends.

Hot start will be key

San Jose comes in not having played since Friday, a fast start would be ideal to have against a team probably dealing with a little bit of rust. The problem however will be holding onto that lead even if they get it because we know how this team is about maintaining leads.

Team Metrics

PHI CF%: 50.43

SJS CF%: 52.46

PHI xGF%: 51.44

SJS xGF%: 54.12

Obviously, the Sharks have the Flyers’ number in the two main team metrics. What has seemingly hurt them so far in the early season in terms of their players’ raw point totals and overall team success is, luck. The Sharks PDO is sixth worst in the league and a big chunk of that is their second worst 5.88 shooting percentage.

As big of a believer in the importance of advanced stats that I am, screw the Sharks bad luck because it cannot even come close to the insanity we saw last night and over the past few games.

Are we projected to win? That’s silly, of course we aren’t

Corsica.hockey’s prediction models have the Flyers losing (shocking!!!) to San Jose tonight. They come out at an average of 45.1% with the highest chance being at 49.9% and the lowest at 41%.

Flyers Projected Lines

Forwards

Giroux - Couturier - Voracek

Martel - Patrick - Simmonds

Konecny - Filppula - Raffl

Lehtera - Laughton - Weise

Defensemen

Provorov - MacDonald

Hagg - Gostisbehere

Manning - Sanheim

Goalies

Neuvirth

(Elliott)