Quick Hits: March 7, 2022
1) The Flyers returned to practice on Monday at the FTC in Voorhees. Everyone with the exception of Kevin Connauton (injured in Saturday's game against Chicago) was presented and accounted for on the ice. There will be three lineup changes on Tuesday when the Flyers host the Vegas Golden Knights at the Wells Fargo Center.
Gerry Mayhew will return to the lineup after being a healthy scratch on Saturday. Max Willman will exit the lineup.
Nick Seeler will rejoin the lineup, in place of Connauton. Flyers interim head coach Mike Yeo said that Connauton, who needed assistance off the ice after a questionable high hit from Chicago's Kirby Dach, is now feeling much better two days later. Connauton may resume skating on Tuesday.
Carter Hart will get the start in goal for the Flyers.
Everything else, including power play units, alignments, and 5-on-5 combinations will remain the same as on Saturday. The projected lineup is:
28 Claude Giroux - 21 Scott Laughton - 11 Travis Konecny 86 Joel Farabee - 19 Derick Brassard - 89 Cam Atkinson 23 Oskar Lindblom - 13 Kevin Hayes - 25 James van Riemsdyk 20 Gerry Mayhew - 38 Patrick Brown - 17 Zack MacEwen
9 Ivan Provorov - 61 Justin Braun 6 Travis Sanheim - 70 Rasmus Ristolainen 3 Keith Yandle - 24 Nick Seeler
79 Carter Hart [35 Martin Jones]
2) Yeo said that there is consideration being given to moving Travis Sanheim onto a power play unit. Sanheim was a power play regular both in the Western Hockey League and American Hockey League but has only seen scant power play time over most of his NHL career.
Charlie O'Connor asked Yeo why that was the case. Yeo said that, earlier in his NHL career, there was an internal feeling (and data) that suggested that other parts of Sanheim's game suffered when he was asked to play on the power play. However, Yeo said that the past is the past, and Sanheim is now a more mature and experienced NHL player than he was in his previous opportunities. The head coach said it also behooves the Flyers to generate more competition among players for power play time.
3) Patrick Brown, who was waived by the Golden Knights at the end of the preseason and claimed by the Flyers, admitted that playing against his old team does provide a bit of extra motivation. The Flyers' fourth-line center said that he'd been through waivers a couple of previous times and was uncertain if another NHL team would pick him up. Brown, who already had several friends and former Boston College teammates on the Flyers, was happy when Philadelphia claimed him.
4) Recently, Flyers Analytics department director Ian Anderson was Jason Myrtetus' guest on the Flyers Daily podcast. Building off that interview, I wrote an article for PhiladelphiaFlyers.com. The article briefly traces the evolution of analytics use, discusses how the Flyers and other teams procure data, and how it gets applied.
Of course, with internal analytics being such a closely guarded proprietary facet of NHL organizations nowadays, Anderson provided a macro view. Nonetheless it is an informative overview of how the work of an analytics department is geared toward helping head coaches, assistant coaches, GMs, player personnel directors, scouts, etc. to get information that want and can use. The departments are inter-functional, not a counterweight.
To read the article, visit Analytically Speaking: How the Flyers Collect and Use Hockey Data.