UPDATE 11:45 AM
Luke Schenn will return to the Flyers' lineup on Saturday. Brandon Manning is a healthy scratch. Shayne Gostisbehere moves from right defense to the left side in order to accommodate the righthanded-shooting Schenn. Steve Mason gets the start in goal.
PREVIEW: FLYERS VS. BLUE JACKETS
Dave Hakstol's Philadelphia Flyers (14-12-6) are in Ohio on Saturday night to take on John Tortorella's Columbus Blue Jackets (12-19-3). Game time at Nationwide Arena is 7:00 p.m. ET. The game will be televised on CSN Philadelphia.
This is the second of four meetings between the teams this season. On Dec. 5 in Philadelphia, the Blue Jackets had their way with a listless Flyers team and skated to a 4-1 victory. The clubs will rematch on March 5 in Philadelphia and March 22 in Columbus.
The Flyers last played on Thursday, hosting the Vancouver Canucks. Hakstol's team has one game remaining on Monday at home against the St. Louis Blues before a five-night scheduling hiatus over the remainder of Christmas week. The Blue Jackets last played on Thursday on the road against the Arizona Coyotes. On Monday, Columbus pays a visit to the Pittsburgh Penguins and then is off for four nights through Boxing Day.
Flyers Outlook
The Flyers have taken at least one point in 12 of the last 16 games (9-4-3). The club is is 7-2-1 over the past 10 games and has won four of its last five on the road. Although still ranked 29th in the NHL in scoring (2.10 goals per game) Philly has scored three or more goals in seven of the last 10 games.
Although they have not won every game in that span and have had several uneven performances along the way, the Flyers have played greatly improved hockey on the whole over the last 16 games. The last absolute clunker the Flyers produced was the 4-1 loss to the Blue Jackets on Dec. 5. For the month of December, the Flyers bring a 5-2-1 record into Saturday's game.
On Thursday night, Philly overcame a slow start to blank Vancouver, 2-0. Making his first start in 10 days, goaltender Steve Mason cranked out a 36-save gem. Michael Raffl and Sean Couturier provided the goal support.
Claude Giroux leads the Flyers with 11 goals, 17 assists and 28 points in 32 games. He is followed by Jakub Voracek (two goals, 18 assists, 20 points) Wayne Simmonds (seven goals, 10 assists, 17 points, 65 penalty minutes) and Brayden Schenn (seven goals, eight assists, 15 points). In 16 games since his recall from the AHL, offensive-minded rookie defenseman Gostisbehere has contributed six goals (four on the power play, three in overtime), five assists and 11 points. Couturier rounds out the top six with five goals, six assists and 11 points in 26 games played.
Michal Raffl has scored three goals in the Flyers' last six games, including the lone Flyers' goal in the previous meeting with Columbus. Couturier has tallies in back-to-back games for the second time this season, and has contributed four goals and seven points in the team's last nine games. Prior to Mason's shutout victory over the Canucks, Michal Neuvirth had started each of the three previous games. Neuvirth leads the NHL in save percentage (.937) and has posted an 8-4-2 record and 2.06 goals against average to date. Mason is 6-8-4 with a 2.76 goals against average and .912 save percentage. Neuvirth has recorded three shutouts while Mason has two shutouts plus a regulation shutout in a 1-0 overtime loss.
Veteran defenseman Luke Schenn (left ankle/foot) got hurt late in the Dec. 5 game against the Blue Jackets. He has not played since then. Schenn is now healthy enough to play and practiced on Friday. However, Hakstol may give the defenseman some additional rest especially in light of the team's 3-1-1 record over its last five games.
Sam Gagner (concussion, laceration) is ready to come off the injured reserve list and rejoin the lineup when Hakstol chooses to play him. Defenseman Mark Streit is on long-term injured reserve for surgery to repair a displaced pubic plate. Streit is expected to miss approximately six weeks from Nov. 17 and may be able to return as soon as Dec. 27.
Blue Jackets Outlook
Columbus has posted a 12-12-3 record since Tortorella took over as head coach after the club staggered out of the gates to an 0-7-0 start. There have been more downs than ups lately, as the club is 2-5-3 over its last 10 games and the club has been surrounded by potential distractions.
The Blue Jackets' win in Philadelphia earlier this month was the club's best all-around performance of the month. On Thursday, however, the Blue Jackets outgunned the Arizona Coyotes in a 7-5 road win to snap a five-game winless streak (0-3-2) following the win over the Flyers. Just prior to the win in Philly, the Blue Jackets had a three-game winless stretch (0-2-1) dating back to their final game of November.
No matter how they fare against the rest of the league or whatever injuries or internal issues they've deal with at a given time, Columbus seems to give the Flyers fits. Philly is 1-7-1 in its last nine games against the Blue Jackets, dating back to the 2013-14 season. The Flyers are winless (0-5-1) in their last six road games in Columbus.
With the club struggling of late, the hard-nosed Tortorella has sent unsubtle messages to his team by making ex-Flyers left winger Scott Hartnell a healthy scratch on Dec. 4 and doing the same to the team's marquee player, Ryan Johansen, on Thursday against Arizona. One game prior to that, Johansen sat on the bench for the entire third period of a 5-1 road loss to the Dallas Stars.
Hartnell responded to his one-game banishment from the lineup with a three-point (power play goal, two assists) game against the Flyers. The entire team brought its A-game that night. Previously slumping forward Nick Foligno victimized Mason with a pair of sniper goals.
It remains to be seen how the Johansen situation plays out. In the club's Oct. 22 road game against the Minnesota Wild, Johansen sat on the bench during the third period. He then missed the next two games, officially due to an illness. During Johansen's most recent removal from the lineup, Torotella made no pretense of it being anything other than a coach's decision involving a healthy player.
Johansen, an All-Star last season and a 33-goal scorer the prior year, publicly took full blame for the lapses that led to his removal from the Blue Jackets' lineup last game. Nevertheless, Johansen has allegedly clashed with Tortorella over his conditioning and attention to detail on the ice almost since the time of the coach's arrival.
On Friday, Johansen admitted to The Columbus Dispatch that a health scare over the summer (elevated heart rate) affected his off-season conditioning. Trade rumors have swirled around Johansen in recent weeks. Both Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekà¤là¤inen and club president John Davidson have publicly thrown their support behind Tortorella to run his team as the coach sees fit.
In the meantime, the Blue Jackets have been without former Vezina Trophy winning goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky since Dec. 8. He is likely to remain on injured reserve until after the Christmas break with a recurrent groin issue. In his absence, rookie Joonas Korpisalo has started twice. Korpisalo got pulled after two periods in the Dallas game. Curtis McElhinney, who allowed one goal on seven shots in relief of Korpisalo against the Stars, stopped 27 of 32 shots against Arizona. It was enough to win the game.
The Blue Jackets did not practice on Friday. It will not be clear until the team holds its morning skate how the lineup would look for Saturday. The projected lineup below is based solely on Thursday's game. There could be some changes, starting with getting Johansen back into the lineup.
Even apart from Bobrovsky, the Blue Jackets have an extensive injury list. Tpp pairing defensemen Jack Johnson (upper body) and David Savard (lower body) are both questionable for Saturday's game. In the meantime, Rene Bourque (upper body), Cody Goloubef (broken jaw) and Markus Hannikainen (shoulder) are all on the injured reserve list.
Hartnell leads the Blue Jackets with 13 goals and 25 points. He is followed by Johansen at six goals and 22 points, Brandon Saad (11 goals, 21 points), Cam Atkinson (10 goals, 21 points), Boone Jenner (12 goals, 19 points), Foligno (five goals, 13 assists, 18 points) and Brandon Dubinsky (six goals, 15 points).
The last time the Flyers played the Blue Jackets, former Flyers draftee Michael Chaput was the player involved in the late game hit on Luke Schenn that resulted in Schenn's foot awkwardly buckling underneath him. Chaput subsequently tangled with Brandon Manning and then fought Brayden Schenn. Chaput has since been returned to the AHL's Lake Erie Monsters but there could still be on-ice tensions between the two clubs. The Flyers have experenced a lot of frustration in recent years against Columbus and the Blue Jackets are in dire need of playing the sort of aggressive forechecking game that worked well in the Dec. 5 game.
Key team stat comparisons (NHL overall ranking)
Non-shootout goals per game: Flyers 2.09 (29th), Blue Jackets 2.44 (T-21st) Non-shootout goals against per game: Flyers 2.62 (19th), Blue Jackets 3.06 (28th) 5-on-5 Goals For/Against Ratio: Flyers 42/49, Blue Jackets 55/68 Power play efficiency: Flyers 16.1% (25th), Blue Jackets 18.4% (15th) Penalty killing efficiency: Flyers 80.6% (19th), Blue Jackets 81.7% (13th) Shots per game: Flyers 30.4 (9th), Blue Jackets 28.9 (T-19th) Shots against per game: Flyers 32.5 (29th), Blue Jackets 30.0 (19th) Faceoff percentage: Flyers 49.6% (20th), Blue Jackets 48.7% (24th)
Projected lineups (subject to change, will be updated)
Flyers
12 Michael Raffl - 28 Claude Giroux - 10 Brayden Schenn 93 Jakub Voracek - 14 Sean Couturier - 17 Wayne Simmonds 76 Chris VandeVelde - 78 Pierre-Edouard Bellemare - 25 Ryan White 24 Matt Read - 21 Scott Laughton - 20 R.J. Umberger
15 Michael Del Zotto - 3 Radko Gudas 55 Nick Schultz - 82 Evgeny Medvedev 53 Shayne Gostisbehere - 22 Luke Schenn
35 Steve Mason [30 Michal Neuvirth]
Scratches: Vincent Lecavalier (healthy), Brandon Manning (healthy), Sam Gagner (IR, concussion), Mark Streit (LTIR, displaced pubic plate).
Blue Jackets
43 Scott Hartnell - 41 Alexander Wennberg - 20 Brandon Saad 11 Matt Calvert - 17 Brandon Dubinsky - 13 - Cam Atkinson 71 Nick Foligno - 38 Boone Jenner - 23 David Clarkson 9 Gregory Campbell - 25 William Karlsson - 40 Jared Boll
27 Ryan Murray - 4 Kevin Connauton 51 Fedor Tyutin - 47 Dalton Prout 44 Justin Falk - 2 Andrew Bodnarchuk
70 Joonas Korpisalo / 30 Curtis McElhinney
Scratches: Ryan Johansen (healthy scratch on Thursday), Jack Johnson (questionable, upper body), David Savard (questionable, lower body), Sergei Bobrovsky (IR, groin), Rene Bourque (IR, upper body), Cody Goloubef (IR, jaw), Markus Hannikainen (IR, shoulder).