UPDATE 12:30 PM
The Flyers have made the following roster moves:
* Recalled Carsen Twarynski and Nicolas Aube-Kubel from the AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms.
* Placed Oskar Lindblom and Samuel Morin on LTIR.
* Placed Travis Konecny on IR.
Additionally, the team announced that Tyler Pitlick sustained a concussion in Saturday's game in Minnesota, while Scott Laughton suffered a groin injury.
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GAME 33: FLYERS @ JETS
In the final game of a three-game road trip to play Western Conference teams, Alain Vigneault's Philadelphia Flyers (17-10-5 overall, 7-8-1 away) are in Manitoba on Sunday to play Paul Maurice's Winnipeg Jets (19-11-2 overall, 9-5-1 home). Game time at Bell MTS Place is 5:00 p.m. ET.
The game will be televised on NBCSP+. The radio broadcast will be on 97.5 The Fanatic with an online simulcast on
Flyers Radio 24/7.
This is the first of two meetings between the teams, and the lone game in Winnipeg. The teams will rematch in Philadelphia on Feb. 22. Last season, the teams split the two games, with the Jets hammering the Flyers in Winnipeg (7-1 on Dec. 9, 2018) and the Flyers earning a win on home ice (3-1 on Jan. 28, 2019) in the team's first game after its bye week.
FLYERS OUTLOOK
The already depleted Flyers, down four starting forwards due to injuries (Travis Konecny, Michael Raffl) and serious health issues (Oskar Lindblom, Nolan Patrick), lost two more starting forwards to injury in Saturday's
4-1 loss in Minnesota. Both Tyler Pitlick and Scott Laughton were forced to leave the game due to undisclosed injuries.
The Flyers had a very tough time dealing with tight checking from Minnesota. They generated only 18 shots on goal for the game, and very few dangerous ones among them. James van Riemsdyk tallied the lone Flyers goal, shooting and scoring on a 2-on-1 started by Morgan Frost after Phil Myers got the puck up to Frost in the neutral zone. At the other end, Carter Hart was victimized by weak (or non-existent) netfront coverage on two Minnesota goals and in a multi-shot scramble on the third.
It may be tough for the Flyers, who only have 10 available healthy forwards assuming neither Pitlick nor Laughton are able to play on Sunday, to be able to dress a full lineup against the Jets. The team could be forced to dress seven defenseman and 10 forwards.
The AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms were in action at home in Allentown on Saturday night. With a 4 p.m. central time start in Winnipeg on tap for Sunday, it will be a logistical challenge to get a player up from the Phantoms to Winnipeg in time to enable the Flyers to dress a full lineup.
However, the Phantoms at last have a relatively complete forward lineup again to choose from, after the club was itself decimated by injuries: Andy Andreoff and German Rubtsov both returned to the lineup this weekend for Lehigh Valley. Other options include Carsen Twarynski, Connor Bunnaman (who has been back from injury for nearly two weeks at this point) and Nicolas Aube-Kubel.
For a five-minute portion of the second and third Saturday's game in Minnesota, while Joel Farabee was serving a five-minute major after dropping the gloves with Marcus Foligno in defense of Matt Niskanen, Philadelphia had to rotate nine forwards. Add in the fact that the Flyers were chasing the game, training 3-1 at the time, and it meant burning the candle at both ends on the front end of a back-to-back set. Sean Couturier, for example, was forced to log 22:55 of ice time in a regulation game.
Sunday's game is the epitome of a gut check. The Jets are a good club, and their building is both historically and recently one of the tougher road venues across the NHL. Losers of back-to-back regulation decisions on this road trip and three of their last four games overall, the Flyers have fallen to lower wildcard status in the Eastern Conference standings. Within the Metro Division, the Flyers now trail both Carolina and Pittsburgh by three points after being ahead of both teams just a week ago.
Brian Elliott will get the start in goal for the Flyers on Sunday.
It is an absolute most for the Flyers to get their power play producing. Neither unit is generating much of anything. The team is just 9 for its last 68 (13.2 percent) and 0-for-December (0-for-14) to date. On the flip side, a stout penalty kill in the Minnesota game was one of the few bright spots for Philly. They held the Wild without a single shot on goal in their first three power play opportunities and the Flyers went 5-for-5 overall on the PK.
The Flyers have scored just two goals overall on this road trip. The losses of co-leading goal scorers Konecny (concussion) and Lindblom, have been sorely felt. On Saturday, with the Flyers trailing and way short on the bench up front, Vigneault and his assistant coaches tweaked things to juggle defense pairs specifically with offensive creation from the back end in mind.
Although Claude Giroux and JVR have scored the two goals on the trip thus far, the team desperately needs more from both players as well as from Jakub Voracek and Sean Couturier. Those forwards will have to lead the way in Winnipeg if the Flyers are to win. A goal from the defense corps or a talented rookie forward, such as the 19-year-old Farabee or the 20-year-old Frost, would also be greatly welcomed but it will likely have to be the team's most established point-producing forwards to backbone the attack.
Entering this game, the Flyers have averaged 2.97 goals per game (17th) with allowing 2.72 per game (tied with Winnipeg for 9th). The power play has dropped to 17.4 percent (T-17th) with two shorthanded goal allowed and the penalty kill enters at 85.9 percent (3rd) with two shorthanded goals scored. The team has won faceoffs at a 54.6 percent clip (1st in the NHL).
JETS OUTLOOK
The Jets have been home since Friday, and have had time to process what went wrong in a 5-2 road loss to the lowly Detroit Red Wings (now 8-22-3) on Thursday night.
Matchup wise, it would nice if both the Jets and Flyers were in the second half of a back-to-back, especially with Philly on the road. But this game is yet another disadvantageous fatigue factor matchup for the Flyers. The Flyers have the NHL's single most disadvantageous schedule this season in terms of incoming games as the potentially tired team against a rested opponent vs. games where they're the more rested team against a potentially tired opponent.
One of the reasons why you just have to throw out whatever happened in a regular season series between two clubs when the playoffs role around is that both teams in a playoff series -- since they're playing one another -- are on equal footing in terms of travel and days between games. Only a Game 1 in a series is ever potentially a factor.
The key word, though, is "factor". It's not an excuse. Rather it's simply an added obstacle for the team at the disadvantage. The Flyers did a remarkable job of navigating such games in November, ahd many of the most disadvantageous games -- the final game of a 3-in-4 or 4-in-6 with a more rested opponent on the other side -- were against top-end NHL opponents.
At any rate, before the Jets stumbled in Detroit on the back end of a home-and-home with the Red Wings, Winnipeg had been in a 6-1-1 groove over its previous eight games. Entering Sunday's tilt, the team has won four in a row on home ice. Dating back to the start of a road-heavy November slate, the Jets are 6-1-1 in the last eight games at Bell MTS Place. With the Flyers having slipping below hockey .500 on the road so far this season, Philly has its work cut out.
With the departures of Jacob Trouba and Dustin Byfuglien, the Winnipeg blueline is not as fearsome it seemed in the past. However, Maurice generally has had his club playing pretty good team defense, and workhorse starter Connor Hellebuyck is having an outstanding year in goal for his team.
The Jets power play overall has struggled even more than the Flyers, although Philly's strong October skewed the comparative a bit. Actually, both ends of special teams for the Jets have been a struggle at times -- the team has a miserable 91.8 special teams index number -- but have outscored opponents at 5-on-5 by a 65-55 margin. Comparatively, the Flyers have scored 64 goals at 5-on-5 but allowed 66.
Entering this game, the Jets have averaged 2.88 goals per game (19th) and allowed 2.72 per game (tied with the Flyers for 9th). The power play comes in at 15.5 percent (25th) and the penalty kill at 76.3 percent (27th). The team has won 51.6 percent of their faceoffs (7th).
PROJECTED STARTING LINEUPS (subject to change, will be updated)
FLYERS (based on Saturday's starters, injuries, and line juggling)
28 Claude Giroux - 14 Sean Couturier - 49 Joel Farabee
81 Carsen Twarynski - 13 Kevin Hayes - 93 Jakub Voracek
25 James van Riemsdyk - 48 Morgan Frost - 62 Nicolas Aube-Kubel
72 David Kase - 24 Mikhail Vorobyev - 44 Chris Stewart
9 Ivan Provorov - 15 Matt Niskanen
6 Travis Sanheim - 61 Justin Braun
53 Shayne Gostisbehere - 8 Robert Hägg
37 Brian Elliott
[79 Carter Hart]
Power Play 1: Giroux, JVR, Couturier, Voracek, Gostisbehere
Power Play 2: Hayes, Frost, Farabee, Provorov, Niskanen
Scratches: 5 Phil Myers (healthy), 21 Scott Laughton (groin), 18 Tyler Pitlick (concussion).
IR: 11 Travis Konecny (concussion, indefinite).
LTIR: 55 Sam Morin (torn ACL, out for season), 23 Oskar Lindblom (Ewing sarcoma, out for season), 12 Michael Raffl (broken right pinky finger), 19 Nolan Patrick (migraines)
JETS
81 Kyle Connor - 55 Mark Scheifele - 29 Patrik Laine
27 Nikolaj Ehlers - 26 Blake Wheeler - 28 Jack Roslovic
9 Andrew Copp - 17 Adam Lowry - 85 Mathieu Perreault
57 Gabriel Bourque - 21 Nicholas Shore - 38 Logan Shaw
44 Josh Morrissey - 3 Tucker Poolman
5 Luca Sbisa - 4 Neal Pionk
2 Anthony Bitetto - 88 Nathan Beaulieu
37 Connor Hellebuyck
30 Laurent Brossoit
Power Play 1: Connor, Wheeler, Scheifele, Laine, Pionk
Power Play 2: Roslovic, Copp, Ehlers, Morrissey, Perreault
Scratches: 23 Carl Dahlström (healthy), 19 David Gustafsson (healthy), 46 Joona Luoto (healthy), 18 Bryan Little (ear), 7 Dmitry Kulikov (upper body)
INR/Suspended: 33 Dustin Byfuglien (ankle)
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PHANTOMS TAKE DOWN WOLF PACK
Coming off back-to-back shut out losses and four straight regulation losses in which they'd scored a combined two goals, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms earned a cathartic 4-2 win on Teddy Bear Toss Night at the PPL Center over the Atlantic Division leading Hartford Wolf Pack. One night earlier, the Phantoms were blanked in Hartford.
It did not take long -- just 1:22 after the opening faceoff -- for the Phantoms to end their goal drought and bring forth a deluge of stuffed animals from the stands for donation to children in need during the holiday season. Defenseman Chris Bigras (2nd goal of the season) did the scoring honors.
Late in the first period, Nicolas Aube-Kubel (5th) ended a personal 15-game goal drought as he finished off a shorthanded 2-on-1 rush feed from German Rubtsov at 15:57.
After a scoreless second period, Hartford's Ryan Gropp (1st) got the Wolf Pack back to within 2-1 at 2:22 of the final stanza. Gerry Fitzgerald (2nd) restored the two-goal margin for the Phantoms with what proved to be a vital insurance goal at 11:38. Hartford's Vinni Letteri (10th) turned a Nate Prosser hooking penalty into a power play goal at 16:36 to narrow the gap back to a single goal.
Finally, with 1:36 left on the clock, defenseman Tyler Wotherspoon got the puck up to rookie winger Maksim Sushko (4th), and Sushko scored into an empty net to ice a 4-2 win. Goaltender J-F Berube got the secondary assist on the empty netter in addition to his 26 saves on 28 shots. With Igor Sheshterkin getting the night off for Hartford, Adam Hushka stopped 29 of 32 Phantoms shots in a losing cause.
The Phantoms (11-11-5) are right back in action on Friday, playing the Bears (13-9-5) in Hershey. Last weekend home-and-home set turned pretty chippy and nasty in the back end game at Giant Center. Game time is 5 p.m. ET.
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