A nightmare has struck the city of Philadelphia. During the Flyers’ big and embarrassing loss to the Buffalo Sabres Wednesday night, goaltender Dan Vladar suffered an injury and had to be pulled after the first period.
While the Flyers confirmed the swap to put Sam Ersson in was due to injury (and not for allowing two goals on five shots in 20 minutes), the true confirmation that Vladar is going to at least miss Thursday’s game against the Pittsburgh Penguins came the morning after. According to multiple reports, the Flyers are recalling young netminder Aleksei Kolosov ahead of the game on the other side of the state.
No surprise here, but told from a league source that goalie Aleksei Kolosov will be recalled to the Flyers for tonight's game in Pittsburgh.
— Kevin Kurz (@KKurzNHL) January 15, 2026
Flyers recall Aleksei Kolosov in middle of potential goaltending crisis
Kolosov of course has some baggage with the Flyers and the fan base. The 24-year-old Belarussian netminder was part of the nasty and dysfunctional three-goaltender crease last season and through 17 games, earned an .867 save percentage and a 3.59 goals against average — was essentially one of the worst goalies in the entire NHL, but he believed he belonged there. And even so, his stretches in the AHL (when he was sent down last season), weren’t much better as they came together for an abysmal .884 save percentage and 3.11 goals against average.
But this season, after understanding what league he should really be in at his level, has been a different story. In 19 games for the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, Kolosov has earned a much better .908 save percentage and a 2.54 goals against average. And when the Flyers needed him back in November, was sufficient enough. He stopped all seven shots after coming in relief against the Maple Leafs and then during his start against the Flames, saved 19 of 21 shots for a .905 save percentage. That’s a whole lot better than what we all saw last year.
To make this move work, since the Flyers have a full 23-man roster, they are moving forward Bobby Brink to the injured reserve list retroactively to January 6. By doing this, since Brink can be then brought back on the regular roster at any time (having already passed the seven-day minimum that is required for the injured reserve list) — if they moved Vladar to the injured reserve list instead, they would have to wait that whole seven days to then bring him back.
This is basically ensuring that they are not completely sure how severe Vladar’s injury is. They know that he will not be healthy enough to be a part of the tandem Thursday night in Pittsburgh, but beyond that? No clue. There are brief glimpses during Wednesday night’s broadcast where you could see that the Flyers starter was laboring on some saves, but it’s not certain.
According to The Athletic’s Kevin Kurz, Vladar’s injury is “not too serious”, and the team is just waiting for some results to come back. That’s at least some good news that the Flyers’ season isn’t now doomed with Vladar out.
It will be very interesting to see just who starts Thursday night against the Penguins, though. Sam Ersson is the easy answer as the more experienced netminder, but with his massive failures in between the pipes this season and the team allegedly looking for his replacement, could they just throw Kolosov in a starting role right away to see if he can handle replacing Ersson full-time? Maybe.
This game just feels like a loss, anyways.
