On Saturday night, against the red-hot Tampa Bay Lightning, the Philadelphia Flyers aspired to take two points. Or at least get a loser point from the formidable foe. They were playing them again on Monday night for an oddly slated two-game miniseries with both games at Xfinity Mobile Arena. But after giving up the first goal to a wide-open Nikita Kucherov less than two minutes in, Philadelphia’s Garnet Hathaway’s first of the year tied things up. After that, Ersson should’ve settled down. Should have.
Unfortunately, Ersson began looking a bit leaky, then a lot leaky. By the third period, Tampa was essentially shooting the puck in the same area against Ersson. And Ersson, whether hoping to get pulled or hoping the Flyers would play with six skaters the rest of the game, had no answers. A miserable 7-2 outing that saw him stop 16 out of 23 shots. That works out to a .696 save percentage. Afterwards, Tocchet said he had a rough night but didn’t put much stock in Ersson getting the Bronx cheers from fans after making a stop. Some players like Owen Tippett and others showed their support for the beleaguered backup, trying to spin what looks like a situation that continues to be in total freefall.
“Well, yeah, listen, we’re in a game of pressure and results, don’t get me wrong,” Tocchet said Wednesday after a practice. “I don’t want to put a ton of pressure on him. Does he know he has to play better? Yeah. Do we need some certain things from him? Yeah. But I don’t want him to go into every game saying, ‘Oh my god, if I let this goal go in, here we go again.’ We can’t have that attitude. So we got to help him out. And helping out is not turning over the puck and giving a guy a breakaway the first 10 minutes of the game. Last night we gave another breakaway to a team because somebody mismanaged the puck at the blue line. You can help your goalie that way. You can play better in front of him.”
Ersson has two wins since the start of December. In 16 starts this year, he has had four games over a .900 save percentage, often considered the line separating competent National Hockey League goaltenders from those who are probably a stopgap at best. And with the Flyers needing to get something far more than an .858 save percentage the rest of the way to keep their playoff chances alive from their “B” goaltender, it appears Philadelphia might have to look at a few different options to get things back on track.
We’ll look at a few options available to the Flyers if they decide to do something with Ersson. This won’t be a dive into available backup goalies and what would be needed to land a new backup. But given how poorly Ersson has been overall (despite some bright spots in overtimes and shootouts), it’s a conversation that Tocchet and Flyers general manager Danny Briere are going to have to have. That’s assuming that chat hasn’t started already.
Option 1: Some time to reset
As most will recall last season, Philadelphia wasn’t averse to having a three-ring circus in goal last season. Ersson, Ivan Fedotov, and Aleksei Kolosov were up with the big club for various stretches of the 2024-25 campaign. And while nothing really worked, it was an option that Philadelphia decided to go with. Nobody was expecting them to be in playoff contention. And with the team selling pieces off in January 2025, having bad goaltending only improved chances for more lottery balls in the draft.
So, while it would be a situation where some moves down the ladder would be required, especially in Lehigh Valley, it might be an option to call up Aleksei Kolosov for a few games. The simplest thing would be to call Kolosov up as the Flyers sent down defenseman Adam Ginning back to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms on Tuesday. However, if Jamie Drysdale is back in the lineup, then Briere would have to figure out another way to maintain three goaltenders on the 23-man roster. The only other logical possibility would be sending Denver Barkey back to Lehigh Valley for a few games to get Kolosov some action without making any move with Ersson. But that seems it might be a bit of a long shot given Barkey’s play in his first three weeks of action.
Having Kolosov in between the pipes might briefly help the situation, especially if Philadelphia opted to go that route with a back-to-back against Buffalo and Pittsburgh Wednesday and Thursday night. They also have another back-to-back near the end of the month against Columbus and Boston. Otherwise, it appears Ersson will be in for one of those two games this week. While nobody will come out and say it, it’s no secret that the Flyers clearly can’t be pleased with how Ersson has fared in recent weeks.
Option 2: Sending Ersson down
Which brings up to the second possibility. If the Flyers decide they don’t want to temporarily rehash the three-man goaltending blueprint like last year, then they could decide to send Sam Ersson down to Lehigh Valley. Being 25 years of age, Ersson would have to be placed on waivers in order to be sent down. Given how undesirable some of his numbers and metrics are, it’s probably a strong chance that nobody would decide to take a chance on the Swedish goaltender and claim him. If another team did, that would take care of Ersson’s cap hit and roster spot. But most likely Ersson would not get claimed. After clearing waivers, that would probably leave Philadelphia with calling up Kolosov to be Dan Vladar’s backup. Or the Flyers could give Carson Bjarnason a shot and see what he could do in a handful of games while Ersson gets some game action in the minors against lesser competition.
A few games where he can regain his confidence, look sharp, and get a few wins under his belt might be the best case scenario currently. Especially if Ersson has any chance of being in the picture once the 2025-26 season concludes. As it stands now, he’ll have to have one hell of a second half if he’s going to remain in the mix for one of the two spots this coming September. Maybe some time in the American Hockey League could be just what the doctor ordered.
Option 3: The ejection button
Philadelphia would have to have kicked a few tires if they decided to sever ties with Ersson this far into the season. A trade possibility would have to be sweetened with picks and a prospect. And that’s a road Briere doesn’t look like he’ll venture down to remove himself of what’ll be a half season of the Swedish keeper. Nobody is eagerly looking to improve their goaltending position and looking at Sam Ersson as a viable option. It also seems likely Ersson won’t be receiving a qualifying offer for $1.6 million being a restricted free agent at year’s end. As for a buyout, well the buyout window has closed for Ersson, so they can’t simply part company with him and pay him a portion of his salary next year.
So while it’s possible Philadelphia could bury his contract for the rest of the year, it appears that this option of simply cutting ties via trade or some other route might be the most unlikely. It’s been a trying few seasons for Ersson, thrust into a starter’s role he clearly wasn’t ready for the second half of 2023-24. And part of a gong show that composed most of last year with himself, Fedotov and Kolosov. He’s still relatively young for a goaltender being just 25. But it just hasn’t been working like probably he and the Flyers would like it to be. Nobody wanted this to happen to Sam Ersson. But the numbers don’t like. And the current numbers make a playoff position all the more difficult given the condensed schedule. Should Tocchet go the route of using Vladar 30 to 35 games the rest of the way, then the backup position is irrelevant. That’s an option that doesn’t seem to be on the table. At least not right now.
As it stands, Philadelphia have some options. But the option of Sam Ersson providing decent to quality starts as a backup to Vladar is losing his luster daily.
