With the trade deadline front and center, the Flyers played a game they’d like to forget. Mistakes, miscues and no sense of synergy resulted in the Utah Mammoth shutting out Philadelphia 3-0 Thursday night.
The basics
First period: No scoring
Second period: 1:38- Nick Schmaltz (Dylan Guenter, Sean Durzi) (PPG), 8:03- Clayton Keller (Dylan Guenter)
Third period: 18:12- Michael Carcone (Kevin Stenlund, John Marino) (ENG)
SOG: 16 (PHI) – 23 (UTA)
Some takeaways
Ristolainen, Deslauriers both play
With the trade deadline tomorrow, the Philadelphia Flyers optioned to keep going with the lineup they usually use. No “roster management” decision on this night, as defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen (playing his 800th career game) and fourth-liner Nic Deslauriers both dressed for the game. Some might have suspected that one or both players might leave the game due to a pending trade. Others believed neither player would risk the chance of injury and spoiling a possible trade. But that wasn’t the case. Ristolainen was in the starting lineup, blocking a shot early on. His opening shift was roughly two minutes as Utah kept the Flyers hemmed in their own zone.
The defenseman took a regular shift in the first, ending up with 7:54 time on ice. In the second, after Philadelphia tried to score on a Travis Sanheim wraparound, Utah’s Clayton Keller ended up scoring on some iffy zone coverage. Ristolainen didn’t do much to stop the rush, Sanehim lost a race to retrieve the puck, and by the time Keller had it on his stick, Matvei Michkov misread the coverage. Keller slid it by Vladar for a 2-0 lead. Through two periods Ristolainen was tied with Sanheim with a 60 per cent Corsi, both leading all Flyers in that metric.
As for Deslauriers, he took an early shift but then saw the fourth line featuring Carl Grundstrom, Sean Couturier, and Garnet Hathaway. But he was kept to his rather limited ice time. After the first he had four shifts, three of them being 30 seconds or under for a grand total of 2:33
Vladar good, not stellar
Dan Vladar got the nod again Thursday night, his fourth game in five since the Flyers returned from the Olympic break. And like his three post-Olympic starts, Vladar, who was topping the league in terms of percentage of starts allowing two of fewer goals (nearly 69 per cent) saw more Utah players than he wanted early as the Flyers were guilty of some sloppy play and a few icings. Vladar also took a shot off his mask which took the mask off. Fortunately, the subsequent shot didn’t get near the maskless keeper. His best save of the first was on a shot by JJ Peterka that he got enough of before it hit the post. The chance resulted from another terrible neutral zone turnover.
In the second, the Flyers’ Noah Cates took a minor penalty. Eight seconds later it was in the net. Utah forward and sniper Dylan Guenther drew a few Flyer penalty killers in and delivered a great pass to Nick Schmaltz whose one-timer beat Vladar who had little chance on it. On the whole, Vladar was keeping Philadelphia in the game, but the Flyers weren’t doing a lot to help themselves. It was a game where the forwards were fighting it all night.
Schmaltzy gets things started!
— Utah Mammoth (@utahmammoth) March 6, 2026
1-0, Utah. pic.twitter.com/cDhC3dytQo
Vladar was good. No bad goals. No real fat rebounds in front of him. But when your team can’t score against a rather strong tight-checking team in Utah, it’s extremely difficult task to earn one point, forget earning two. The play that epitomized the game was during the Flyers’ third power play. A pass at the blue line was intercepted and the puck was heading for no man’s land. Vladar raced out to get to the puck first, but with him so badly out of position, Trevor Zegras took a penalty to prevent an almost certain goal into an empty net.
On the Brink?
Another Flyer thought to possibly be on the move before the deadline was winger Bobby Brink. Brink, who has done a yeoman’s job of keeping himself in the lineup and being great on both sides of the puck, Like a lot of the Philadelphia players, Brink didn’t seem to have a lot of flow early one. Whether it was the possible deadline moves looming or some other explanation, the club looked a bit off. Fortunately Utah wasn’t much better after a bit of an early flurry.
The closest the Flyers got to a scoring attempt was a low percentage shot on the goal line by Sean Couturier. But late in the first Brink took a nice backhand pass from Matvei Michkov and drew the game’s first penalty. Although the unit featuring Trevor Zegras and Michkov were essentially one-and-done in their shift, Philadelphia had more problems when the next unit simply couldn’t handle the pressure and aggressiveness of Utah’s penalty kill.
Brink had a great chance after the power play. The puck went right to him after some traffic in front. His quick shot was stopped by Utah’s goalie Vitek Vanacek who made a great glove save.
Denver Barkey a little lost
Looking a bit more like he’s gone to the Trevor Zegras school of hairstyling, winger Denver Barkey isn’t quite lighting up the scoreboard but was doing a lot of little things correctly. However on this night he had a few miscues, including a bad giveaway in the second that Vladar bailed him out on. While looking engaged at times, Barkey was not having a great night like a lot of his teammates through two periods. Outside of Deslauriers, Barkey’s Corsi For percentage was the lowest among Flyers forwards at just 36.84 per cent.
On a night where Travis Konecny’s presence was sorely missed, the Flyers needed a few forwards to step up and chip in. Sadly Barkey wasn’t one of them against the Mammoth. When a team scrounges up just 11 shots through two periods, you have to make the most of your chances. Philadelphia didn’t.
Drinking game for Flyers shots?
The Flyers had just 16 shots on the night. It tied a season low for shots. Meanwhile, the Flyers set another record they would not like to set by having eight consecutive games where they recorded 25 shots or less. It’s not the way to win hockey games. And with 21 games remaining, it might make the last quarter of the season a bit harder to watch. Hence, perhaps a drinking game where one takes a shot for every shot the Flyers take might be the panacea for the next 63 periods of hockey.
Drysdale has an up and down tilt
Defenseman Jamie Drysdale has been very solid of late, chipping in a lot in terms of offensive production while holding his own on the defensive side. After some iffy shifts in the first, Drysdale nearly tied the game minutes after Utah’s opening goal. Unfortunately Vanacek made a key save and Drysdale couldn’t bury the rebound behind him. The defenseman was up on the play a bit more often than expected yet was able to get back on what looked to be a three-on-one for Utah in transition.
Third period was more of the same
The Flyers had their work cut out for them, and after a good shift by the Flyers which drew a penalty, they went to work on the power play. Trevor Zegras had a low-percentage chance from near the point which Vanacek gloved easily. In a game where they needed to score on the power play, the Flyers did a credible job of shooting themselves in the foot and killing their own power play. After trying to set something up, the puck bounced over Sanheim’s stick and that was that.
Minutes later Clayton Keller high-sticked Garnet Hathaway which gave Philadelphia yet another chance at life. But the Flyers took a penalty to make it four-on-four. The Flyers best chance of the night came roughly halfway through the third when Carl Grundstrom took a pass from Owen Tippett. Grundstrom had the puck in close but Vanacek was up to the challenge. The longer the period went on, it appeared Philadelphia might only havve a chance if head coach Rick Tocchet pulled Vladar for an extra attacker with a lot of time remaining. Instead the Flyers went with six skaters with just over three minutes to go. They maintained offensive zone time
All stats courtesy of NHL.com and Natural Stat Trick
