The Game: 3 p.m. on NBCSports Philadelphia
Live look inside Flyers’ locker room:
Jokes aside, it’s been quite a week for the Flyers. They got shut out in back-to-back games against the New Jersey Devils and New York Islanders, and made a trade midgame that sent Joel Farabee and Morgan Frost to the Calgary Flames. We’ve written a lot about that trade on Broad Street Hockey, from the cap implications to a dose of cold hard reality, so we won’t spill too much ink on it in today’s preview.
Not to get lost in the departure of two homegrown players, the Flyers got two guys back: Andrei Kuzmenko (who could provide some scoring pop) and Jakob Pelletier. It’s up in the air whether one or both of them will be able to join the team in Denver today due to visa issues, but the hope is that they’ll both be present for the match against Utah on Tuesday. If they do make their Flyers debut this afternoon, keep an eye on their usage–both are wingers, which should fill in the gap left by Farabee and perhaps allow Tyson Foerster or Owen Tippett to shift back to their natural positions at right wing.
Right, so, the Flyers: they’ve been really bad–and it’s not even completely on the goaltenders this time! Sam Ersson and Ivan Fedotov could’ve stood on their heads, but you can’t win hockey games when you don’t score any goals, and the Flyers have failed to do so for almost seven periods of hockey. Travis Konecny and Matvei Michkov’s goal droughts sit at six games and, as the de facto offensive dynamos of the team, that’s not great! The Flyers need their top players to score if they hope to win games, because Noah Cates was bound to fall back to Earth.
However, the Flyers might get some jump from a slew of new and returning players. If Pelletier and Kuzmenko aren’t ready to go, the Flyers have called up Jacob Gaucher from the Lehigh Valley Phantoms to get his first taste of NHL action with the team. The Flyers have also recalled Emil Andrae and Aleksei Kolosov; it’ll be great to see Andrae back with the team, but bringing back Kolosov does raise concern about a Fedotov injury (he got run into pretty hard against the Islanders). Kolosov has…not been great in his stint with the Phantoms, allowing five goals in two of his three starts. Anthony Richard and Rodrigo Abols are still with the team, too, so John Tortorella will have plenty of opportunity to shuffle the lineup.
The Colorado Avalanche, meanwhile, seem to have found their groove. Amazing what a stable netminder does for a contending team! Mackenzie Blackwood has been up and down in January, but a shutout against the St. Louis Blues on Friday should help him get his head right. Of course, the trade for Blackwood–and his subsequent contract extension–pale in comparison to another move the Avs made a couple weeks ago, but more on that below.
As far as today’s match goes, it does not favor the Flyers in the slightest: the Avs are a powerhouse team with some of the brightest stars in the league, and they fixed their goaltending. The Flyers are going to have to be especially careful to avoid taking penalties, because a power play made up of Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar, Martin Necas, Artturi Lehkonen and Jonathan Drouin is not a bear you want to poke. Also, scoring some goals might be nice–maybe try doing that, Flyers?
Storylines to Follow
Hello, new guy(s)!
We alluded to it earlier, but the Flyers have a quite a few players who could make their debuts with the team today: either Pelletier or Kuzmenko from the Flames (unlikely), or Gaucher coming up from the Phantoms. Gaucher signed an entry-level contract with the organization in December, and has 14 goals and 27 points in 44 games with the Phantoms. What’s most intriguing is that, at 24, he’s a guy that’s young enough to be part of the rebuild process.
Welcome back, other guys!
As part of the roster shuffling, the Flyers sent down Adam Ginning in order to recall Emil Andrae–and Aleksei Kolosov is back, too. Andrae’s here because Egor Zamula’s been retroactively placed on injured reserve, and Kolosov is here because Fedotov looked a little off after a collision against the Isles. Whether Kolosov suits up for tonight remains to be seen, but it seems more than likely that Andrae will play. Since returning to the Phantoms, Andrae has played 15 games in Lehigh Valley and posted two goals and nine points–and that’s good enough to have earned the call up. Hopefully, he’s able to stick around for the remainder of the season, because the team desperately needs a guy who can move the puck like he does.
Another team that made a big midseason trade
No disrespect to the players involved in the Flyers-Flames deal, but the Mikko Rantanen for Martin Necas (and other players/picks) trade stands as the most consequential midseason move in decades; the only other one that comes to mind was when Joe Thornton was sent to San Jose in the midst of an MVP season. In the short term, the trade between Colorado and Carolina favors the Canes: they got the best player in the deal, plus Taylor Hall, and the Avs had to move on from a franchise cornerstone who was going to get that bag on his next contract.
Don’t sleep on Necas, though: in four games with his new team, he’s got a goal and five points. His torrid scoring pace from earlier in the season has slowed down considerably, but playing on a line with MacKinnon seems to agree with him so far. Where many GMs would be too scared to make such an impactful move during the regular season, the front offices of the Avalanche and Carolina were fearless–and maybe this is something that becomes more common in the NHL.
Projected Lineups
Philadelphia Flyers
Tyson Foerster – Noah Cates – Travis Konecny
Anthony Richard – Sean Couturier – Matvei Michkov
Scott Laughton – Rodrigo Abols – Bobby Brink
Jacob Gaucher – Garnet Hathaway
Cam York – Travis Sanheim
Emil Andrae – Rasmus Ristolainen
Nick Seeler – Jamie Drysdale
Erik Johnson
Sam Ersson
(Aleksei Kolosov)
Colorado Avalanche
Artturi Lehkonen – Nathan MacKinnon – Martin Necas
Jonathan Drouin – Casey Mittelstadt – Juuso Parsisnen
Miles Wood – Jack Drury – Ross Colton
Joel Kirivanta – Parker Kelly – Logan O’Connor
Devon Toews – Cale Makar
Sam Girard – Josh Manson
Keaton Middleton – Sam Molinski
Mackenzie Blackwood
(Scott Wedgewood)
Gameday Tunes
There were a lot of Fara-believers out there, and this trade’s a tough one for quite a few fans. That’s the nature of rebuilds, though, so on we go.
Stats courtesy Natural Stat Trick
