In a rematch of last week’s season opening Flyers victory in Vancouver, the Canucks came into South Philadelphia and returned the favor in a shutout of the Orange and Black. Spoiling the night for the Flyers was goalie Kevin Lankinen, whose 26 save shutout quieted a crowd ready for a Michkov explosion. But, to be very honest, it’s not like the Flyers were incredibly deserving in this one – the Canucks thoroughly outplayed the Flyers in the first half of the game and the Flyers put on a clinic in missing the net in the second half of it.
The Basics
First period: 16:09 – Nils Hoglander (Petterson, Garland)
Second period: 8:40 – Brock Boeser (Myers, DeBrusk), 9:30 – Kiefer Sherwood (Blueger)
Third period: No scoring
SOG: 32 (VAN) – 26 (PHI)
Some Takeaways
Miss, miss, and guess what? Miss again!
It feels as if the Flyers have enough missed chances and shot attempts to fill an entire season in these first five games, and that was on full display tonight against the Canucks. There was plenty of booted chances to go around in this one, whether it was Sean Couturier twice on the same third period shift, Morgan Frost, and especially if you’re Owen Tippett. John Tortorella talked a lot about how the team needs to be better at finishing, and these first five games are not instilling much confidence in their ability to do so. It’ll be interesting to see if the team sees some positive regression in the upcoming stretch of games, or if this will remain a massive problem all season long.
Tippett is frustrating yet again
Speaking of missed shots and chances, Owen Tippett is a big culprit here. He is so incredibly close to breaking through, and noticeable on nearly every single shift, but he’s hands down in one of the more frustrating slumps I could imagine a player being in. He’s missing in every way right now, no matter if it’s a chance on a rush, a tap-in on a seemingly wide-open net, or in alone with the goaltender. A few of these chances going in might open the floodgates for Tippett and the Flyers as a whole, but it certainly has to get going soon.
Couturier on fourth line
Interestingly, before the game even started, we had 2024-25’s first John Tortorella demotion that just doesn’t make a lot of sense. The captain was demoted to the fourth line, and even more confusingly, to the wing. From my view, Couturier hasn’t been awful to start the season, and was quite strong in the Calgary game and in parts of the Edmonton/Seattle matchups. It was likely Torts sending his first real message of the season, and who better to pick on than the captain, I guess. Definitely a confusing decision, especially considering that Couturier was one of the more active Flyers in this game.
Kevin Lankinen is nails again
Similar to last weekend, Kevin Lankinen was quite good for the Canucks in goal. This time, he walked away with a shutout win, stopping 26 of 26 en route to the blank sheet. The Flyers certainly helped him out with the amount of missed chances and shots they had, but Lankinen was real good. The Flyers won the expected goals battle 3.01 to the Canucks 1.59, indicating that the Flyers deserved much more than they got in this one. Lankinen certainly was a part of that performance, making all the saves that were required of him.
Erik Johnson looks like a problem
The Erik Johnson on the second pair experiment is going about as bad as everyone thought it would go, and this game was the clearest example of it. On a pair with Drysdale, he looks just a step slow, and it cost the Flyers on numerous occasions tonight, including the first goal of the game from Nils Hoglander.
Individually, Johnson carried a brutal 34.48 Corsi-For% and a 45.16 expected goals-for percentage against the Canucks, and certainly looked the part by the eye-test. The Flyers need Nick Seeler back in a bad way, as the questions surrounding Seeler’s injury swirl. In the meantime, the Johnson-Drysdale pair is doing a disservice to Drysdale, who continues to flash his higher-end potential whenever the pair can get out of its own zone.
Ristolainen-Zamula continues to be bad
Another problem on defense? The third pair still looked bad on the whole, and were a bit of a mess on Vancouver’s second goal of the game. After a few strong games to begin the year, Ristolainen and Zamula have made it three question marks on defense for the Flyers, alongside the previously mentioned Erik Johnson. The return of Nick Seeler can’t solve everything here, so the two are going to need to figure it out in the coming weeks, or Emil Andrae might be here sooner rather than later.