After a big win over the Blues on Thursday to get things rolling again after their long break, the Flyers are back in action tonight with a much more difficult task on their hands — keeping their positive momentum rolling against a much hotter visiting Devils team.
Puck drop: 7:00 p.m.
How to watch/listen:
📺: NBCSP
📻: 97.5 The Fanatic
Pregame reading
- The rumor mill continues to turn, and the most recent word is that the Flyers might just be in the market to bolster their mix of centers. [BSH]
- The Flyers have been pulling off a lot of wins in overtime and the shootout so far this season, which is good, because wins are wins, but eventually they’re really going to need to start taking care of more of that business in regulation. [BSH]
- And finally, things are continuing to go really well for Porter Martone out at Michigan State, and they’re beginning to trend up for his teammate Shane Vansaghi along with that. [BSH]
Pregame watching
By the numbers
Philadelphia Flyers – 10-6-3 (7th in Metro)
Goals: Christian Dvorak/Owen Tippett/Trevor Zegras (6)
Assists: Trevor Zegras (14)
Points: Trevor Zegras (20)
New Jersey Devils – 13-6-1 (2nd in Central)
Goals: Jack Hughes (10)
Assists: Jesper Bratt (13)
Points: Jack Hughes (20)
Projected lineups
Tyson Foerster – Noah Cates – Travis Konecny
Matvei Michkov – Sean Couturier – Bobby Brink
Trevor Zegras – Christian Dvorak – Owen Tippett
Nic Deslauriers – Rodrigo Abols – Garnet Hathaway
*Nikita Grebenkin
Cam York – Travis Sanheim
Emil Andrae – Jamie Drysdale
Nick Seeler – Egor Zamula
*Noah Juulsen
Dan Vladar
(Sam Ersson)
Timo Meier – Nico Hischier – Jesper Bratt
Arseny Gritsyuk – Dawson Mercer – Connor Brown
Ondrej Palat – Juho Lammikko – Evgenii Dadonov
Paul Cotter – Luke Glendening – Stefan Noesen
Jonas Siegenthaler – Simon Nemec
Brenden Dillon – Luke Hughes
Dennis Cholowski – Dougie Hamilton
Jake Allen
(Jacob Markstrom)
Storylines to watch
Keep chipping away at it
Thursday’s game was, though still imperfect, a positive one for the Flyers. Pulling off a full comeback to snag the win is the biggest positive, to be sure, but there were a number of pieces in their underlying process which they can come away feeling good about. Not least of all, of course, was the way that they started the game. Now, it didn’t go without a hitch for them, as they still gave up two goals to necessitate that comeback in the first frame, but coming off of a four day layoff they brought a good level of energy and didn’t look overly rusty, in fact were able to bring a well paced and details focused approach. And in the face of the numerous slow and messy starts that they’ve already amassed through the early part of the season, this felt like one of their better efforts, in spite of the result, and a marked step in the right direction. They weren’t able to snap into immediate perfection — that would be a truly monumental ask — but they were able to get things moving in the right direction, and that’s something. Now, the big question is whether they’ll be able to keep those lessons front of mind tonight, and keep that ball rolling into this tougher matchup.
Skater lineup a little uncertain
It’s worth noting that, while it looks like the Flyers have a lineup in mind for this one — one which is basically the same as the one they iced on Thursday against the Blues, with the exception of Zamula coming in for Juulsen — it isn’t one hundred percent locked in just yet. This morning, Rick Tocchet acknowledged that they have some guys who are a little banged up (though he didn’t specify which ones) and who will be game time decisions. So we’ll see before too long before how this lineup is going to shake out, but that’s certainly something to keep an eye on.
New looks on the back end
One piece of the lineup as far as the skaters are concerned that does seen to be more of a certainty, is the shaking up of the second two pairs on the defense. The tried and true pairing of York and Sanheim will hold, but after a bit of an audition in the later goings of Thursday’s game, Emil Andrae and Jamie Drysdale will see a full game together (leaving a third pairing of Zamula and Seeler, which we feel a little suspicious about, but we’ll see how that goes). The news of this combination getting some real runway to work with comes as a bit of a surprise, as there was a time when it felt like a complete impossibility that the Flyers would consider playing three of their undersized in the same game, let alone stack two of them on the same pair, but with how well Andrae has been playing since his recall and the need for offense which is beginning to grow desperate, it does make sense that they would both reward a well faring player like Andrae, and put two of their better offensive generators together in hopes that they can compliment each other well and help kick start more good possessions for the forwards. It’s a combination that could see itself exposed in the wrong situations, to be sure, but it’s worth giving a look.