We’re back again for a rare bit of Friday hockey for the Flyers, as they close out their road trip with a meeting with the high flying Colorado Avalanche. This trip has been a bit of a mixed bag for them, and the Avalanche will certainly not be an easy matchup for them, but the Flyers have a chance here to show some resilience and respond well after a pretty crushing overtime loss in Utah.
Puck drop: 9:00 p.m.
How to watch/listen:
📺: NBCSP+
📻: 93.3 WMMR
Pregame reading
- Heading into tonight’s matchup against the Avalanche, we have some shuffling that’s been done to the defense pairs. [BSH]
- There’s a good ongoing question here about just how far away the Flyers are from legitimately competing, and we’re going deeper on that with recent Stanley Cup winners as our guide. [BSH]
Pregame watching
By the numbers
Philadelphia Flyers – 23-17-9 (4th in Metro)
Goals: Trevor Zegras (19)
Assists: Travis Konecny/Trevor Zegras (27)
Points: Trevor Zegras (46)
Colorado Avalanche – 34-5-9 (1st in Central)
Goals: Nathan MacKinnon (38)
Assists: Nathan MacKinnon (47)
Points: Nathan MacKinnon (85)
Projected lineups
Trevor Zegras — Christian Dvorak — Travis Konecny
Denver Barkey — Sean Couturier — Owen Tippett
Matvei Michkov — Noah Cates — Bobby Brink
Garnet Hathaway — Lane Pederson – Carl Grundstrom
Cam York — Travis Sanheim
Nick Seeler — Jamie Drysdale
Emil Andrae — Noah Juulsen
Sam Ersson
(Aleksei Kolosov)
Victor Olofsson — Nathan MacKinnon — Martin Necas
Artturi Lehkonen — Brock Nelson — Valeri Nichushkin
Ross Colton — Jack Drury — Gavin Brindley
Zakhar Bardakov — Parker Kelly — Taylor Makar
Sam Malinski — Cale Makar
Josh Manson — Brent Burns
Jack Achan — Sam Girard
Mackenzie Blackwood
(Scott Wedgewood)
Storylines to watch
Let’s try this again…
While the Flyers started out well in Wednesday’s game against the Mammoth, a few bad lapses in judgement and breakdowns in coverage ultimately had that one going sideways on them in a big way. It was a tough sight to see unfold, both for the fact that for a long time it seemed like they had control of that game, as well as that it meant that they had quickly squandered all of the momentum they built up from that huge win over the Golden Knights on Monday. It really did seem like things were moving in the right direction for them again for a bit there, but in spite of the unfortunate blips in their last time out, the Flyers do have a chance here to find a quick reset and at least get back to a stronger process, even if they don’t correct to far and completely as to take down a team with just five regulation losses on the season. The team loves to talk about their belief and their resilience, and this will be another test of it.
No Vladar yet
While the word is that Dan Vladar was able to take a more or less normal skate with the team this morning in Colorado, it seems that he’s still not quite ready to return to action. It’s looking like it won’t be too long before he’s back in the mix, but it won’t be coming tonight.
Tonight’s start, then, will go to Sam Ersson again, and the Flyers will be hoping that he can close out this trip for them on a high note. It’s been a good week for him on the whole, as his play in Vegas was stellar, and he followed that up with a pretty good showing in Utah, albeit one that was spoiled by the mistakes of the skaters in front of him. He hasn’t been perfect, but Ersson’s been putting in some good work to get his game back on track, and here’s hoping that he can keep that moving in the right direction tonight.
Hathaway stays in
Speaking of mistakes and that came in Utah, it was, we recall, a rough one for Garnet Hathaway. It was Hathaway’s casual play with the puck when he had a clear shot at the empty net which cost them what should have been the game winner, and coming as one more thing in a season which hasn’t seen him at his sharpest, it really stung. All the same, the Flyers are sticking with their same lineup from that game, and Hathaway will be right back in the mix on that fourth line. And while it would be easy to argue that the big mistake was enough to earn him a seat for the night, a chance to reset and also to get Nikita Grebenkin back into the lineup to see what he can do, Hathaway’s veteran status has earned him more money in the back (in the parlance of an old coaching staff), and he’ll get more runway to immediately try to respond to that poorer showing. We’ll see what he’s able to do with it.
