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Flyers Gameday: 10/27/18 vs. NYI; Phantoms and Prospect Updates

October 27, 2018, 7:22 AM ET [732 Comments]
Bill Meltzer
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • RSSArchiveCONTACT
Game 11 Preview: Flyers vs. Islanders

Dave Hakstol's Philadelphia Flyers (4-6-0) are in home on Saturday afternoon to take on Barry Trotz's New York Islanders (3-4-1). Game time at the Wells Fargo Center is 1 p.m. EDT.

The game will be televised on NBCSNP. The radio broadcast can be found on 97.5 FM The Fanatic with an online simulcast at FlyersRadio247.com.

This is the first of four meetings this season between the Metro Division teams, but the teams will not see each other again until the stretch drive of the regular season. They will play at Nassau Coliseum on March 3 and March 9 (the preseason game at Barclays Center was the only Brooklyn venue match between the teams). The season series concludes back at the Wells Fargo Center on March 23.

Last season, the Flyers went 1-1-2 against the Islanders. The lone Flyers win was a 6-4 affair in Philadelphia on Jan. 4. The Flyers held a 5-2 lead after two periods but the Islanders sliced the deficit to a single goal with 5:25 remaining in regulation. Finally, a power play empty-netter by Ivan Provorov sealed the victory for Philadelphia.

Flyers Outlook

The Flyers have lost back-to-back games: a 4-1 home defeat at the hands of the Colorado Avalanche on Monday was followed by a 3-0 blanking on the road by the Boston Bruins. After Saturday's game and an off-day on Sunday, the Flyers embark on a four-game road trip to play the three California teams (Anaheim Ducks on Oct. 30, LA Kings on Nov. 1, and San Jose Sharks on Nov. 3) before the trip ends in Arizona to play the Coyotes on Nov. 5.

After looking sharp and confident in a rehab start for the AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms on Wednesday and re-joining the Flyers on Thursday as the backup in the Boston game, Michal Neuvirth is set to be the starting goaltender on Saturday afternoon. At Friday's practice, it appeared as if Mikhail Vorobyev was set to rejoin the lineup after being scratched in each of the last four games. He will center the third line. Jordan Weal, who split fourth-line center reps with Jori Lehterä, appears to be the odd man out for Saturday's game.

James van Riemsdyk (lower-body injury) skated on his own before practice on Friday. He is still a couple weeks from being ready to play again.

The Flyers' most vital team stats and rankings are pretty ugly through the first 1/8 of the season. In nine of the first 10 games this season, the Flyers have trailed first (4-5-0). They lost (to Columbus) the lone game in which they've scored first. Overall, through 10 games, the Flyers have scored 31 goals and yielded 40. At five-on-five, the team has been outscored 24- 20. The power play, currently in a 1-for-16 spell in which the lone goal (vs. New Jersey) was scored by the second unit, has dropped to 16.2 percent for the early season after starting out 5-for-20 (25 percent). The penalty kill has fallen to 67.6 percent to rank 29th.

Islanders Outlook

The Isles are now a well-rested team. They had three nights off after completing their own grueling road trip through Nashville and the California gauntlet (1-3-0, with the lone win being a 7-2 pasting of the Kings). On Wednesday in Brooklyn, the Islanders took one point from a 3-2 overtime loss to the Florida Panthers at Barclays Center. The team has had the last two nights off before heading to Philly for Saturday's matinee and then play the Carolina Hurricanes on Sunday.

Robin Lehner (2-2-1, 2.67 GAA, .926 SV%, shutout vs. San Jose) was the first goalie off at the Islanders' practice on Friday. Most likely, if Lehner starts in Philly, Thomas Greiss (1-2-0, 2.59 GAA, .918 SV%) will get the nod against Carolina.

New York's fatal flaw last year was a lack of defensive structure and below-average goaltending. The team had a high-powered offensive but simply could not outscore their breakdowns. With a new regime in place -- Lou Lamoriello at the GM helm and team presidency with Trotz behind the bench -- and rising young star Mathew Barzal as its marquee player after the departure of John Tavares to Toronto via free agency, the Islanders are in the nascent stages of creating a new identity.

The first noticeable difference: Trotz has brought more structure to a squad that had overrelied on offensive freelancing. So far, tightening things up defensively has come at the expense of sacrificing offense (the Islanders have scored just 22 goals so far as a team, even with the seven-goal outburst against Los Angeles) but the Isles have only yielded 23 so far.

The dynamic Barzal, who is already one of the NHL's most dangerous young offensive talents but is still learning nuances of the 200-foot game, leads the team with eight points but is minus-seven. Josh Bailey has seven points. Ex-Flyers center Valtteri Filppula, who signed with the Islanders as a free agent this summer, surprisingly leads the team with four goals among his six points. Newly appointed team captain Anders Lee has two goals and five points.

When the Flyers play the Islanders, it seems like veteran Cal Clutterbuck often finds a way onto the scoresheet although he doesn't score much against the rest of the league. He has no goals and one assist through eight games this season. He has seven career goals against the Flyers in 24 games. The only team against whom he's scored more goals in his career is the Calgary Flames: eight goals in 35 games, mostly during his years with the Minnesota Wild.

The Islanders have scored 14 goals at 5-on-5 through eight games and yielded 13. The power play enters at 5-for-23 (21.7 percent, ranked 16th) while the PK comes in 18-for-24 (75 percent, tied for 20th). The Flyers, who have yielded two shorthanded goals so far this season and gave up 10 last year, need to be alert to Islanders' counterttacks which have burned them a few times in recent season. To date this season, New York has gotten shorthanded goals by Casey Cizikas and Filppula.

Ex-Flyer Dennis Seidenberg is not on the Islanders roster but continues to practice with the team as a "tryout" player, having never been released from his PTO during training camp. In the event of blueline injuries, the 37-year-old veteran of 859 games, including the 2016-17 and 2017-18 campaigns with the Islanders, would be signed to a one-year contract and step into the lineup. Although not standard practice, there is nothing in the CBA that bans such an arrangement.

PROJECTED LINEUPS (Subject to change)

FLYERS

28 Claude Giroux - 14 Sean Couturier - 11 Travis Konecny
23 Oskar Lindblom - 19 Nolan Patrick - 93 Jakub Voracek
21 Scott Laughton - 24 Mikhail Vorobyev - 17 Wayne Simmonds
22 Dale Weise - 15 Jori Lehterä - 10 Corban Knight

9 Ivan Provorov - 8 Robert Hägg
53 Shayne Gostisbehere - 26 Christian Folin
6 Travis Sanheim - 3 Radko Gudas

30 Michal Neuvirth
[37 Brian Elliott]

Scratches: 40 Jordan Weal (healthy), 47 Andrew MacDonald (healthy), 33 Cal Pickard (healthy), 12 Michael Raffl (IR, lower body), 25 James van Riemsdyk (IR, lower body), 5 Sam Morin (ACL surgery).

ISLANDERS

18 Anthony Beauvillier - 13 Mathew Barzal - 7 Jordan Eberle
27 Anders Lee - 29 Brock Nelson - 12 Josh Bailey
16 Andrew Ladd - 51 Valtteri Filppula - 47 Leo Komarov​
17 Matt Martin - 53 Casey Cizikas - 15 Cal Clutterbuck

2 Nick Leddy - 6 Ryan Pulock
4 Thomas Hickey - 24 Scott Mayfield
3 Adam Pelech - 55 Johnny Boychuk​

40 Robin Lehner
[1 Thomas Greiss]

Scratches: 14 Tom Kuhnhackl (healthy), 21 Luca Sbisa (healthy), 32 Ross Johnston (healthy).

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Phantoms Update

The Lehigh Valley Phantoms (4-2-1) return to action on Saturday, paying a visit to the Binghamton Devils (4-4-1). On Sunday, the Phantoms return to Pennsylvania for a road match against their traditional arch-rival, the Hershey Bears (2-6-1 entering a game tonight against Wilkes Barre/Scranton).

Over on the Flyers official website, we take a look at how the Phantoms have performed through the first seven games of the season. The most pleasant early trend from a prospect watching perspective has been the play of rookie center German Rubtsov. The Flyers' 2016 first-round pick is playing both ends of special teams as well as at even strength and has posted six points (four goals, two assists) plus a shootout goal for Scott Gordon's team.

**********

Prospect Updates: Friday night notables

Eleven different Flyers prospects in the CHL and NCAA circuits were in action on Friday night, with the majority also having games on the docket for Saturday and/or Sunday. Here were Friday's most notable developments.

* Morgan Frost: The Flyers 2017 first-round pick continues to be scorching hot.On Friday night, he put on a dominating show at even strength, the power play and the penalty kill in the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds' 7-4 road win over the Kitchener Rangers. Frost finished the night offensively with even strength and shorthanded goals (his 10th and 11th tallies of the young season), and a power play assist. Frost now has 29 points through 15 games, including 20 points in the last eight games.

In the first minute of the Friday's game, Frost went to the net and scored a rebound goal (10th goal of the season) off the rush to give the Hounds a quick 1-0 lead. On the power play, he started a tic-tac-toe goal sequence finished of by Barrett Hayton. Frost's best work on this night, however, came on the penalty kill. He had a shorthanded scoring chances on successive PKs, finishing off the second one on a backhander upstairs on a 2-on-1 counterattack. Later, with the Hounds leading comfortably in the third period, he dangled around the neutral zone to rag off time, with Kitchener players in futile pursuit and then passed back to his D for a clear down the ice rather than try to beat two defenders and potentially lose the puck.

* Isaac Ratcliffe: Early in the third period of the Guelph Storm's home game against the Erie Otters, the Flyers 2017 second-round pick stashed home a rebound goal to hit the 10-goal mark on the young season and give his team a 4-2 lead. The Storm had led 3-0 after the first period, with Ratcliffe assisting on the first goal. Unfortunately for Guelph, this game slipped away from them.

The Otters came back to tie the game at 4-4 in the third period and then defeated the Storm in OT. Last weekend was also a frustrating one for Guelph, at least last Friday and Saturday, and team captain Ratcliffe vented it the wrong way. He got tagged with misconducts in back-to-back games and, with a target on his back among the officials the next night, took three minors (including an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty that put his team shorthanded in the third period) in last Sunday's game. In Friday's game against Erie, Ratcliffe did not take any penalties; a positive in addition to his goal and assist, because Guelph needs its captain on the ice and not in the penalty box or back in the dressing room.

* Wyatte Wylie: The Everett Silvertips draft-plus-one defenseman continued his excellent two-way start to the 2018-19 season in his team's 2-1 overtime road win in Moose Jaw on Friday night. Wylie logged massive ice time, did yeoman work on Everett's first penalty kill (Wylie himself was in the box on the second), and later scored on the first shift of overtime to win the game for Everett.

* Wyatt Kalynuk: More of a natural offensive defenseman than the "other Wyatte" in the prospect chain, the late-blooming University of Wisconsin blueliner collected power play and even strength assists (the latter was initially credited to him as a goal) and managed to finish at plus-one despite the Badgers going down to a 6-2 loss to Michigan Tech on Friday.

* Joel Farabee: Boston University fell to a shocking 0-4-0 start to the regular, getting smoked 5-0 by Providence College on Friday night. Farabee had two shots on goal and was not out for any of the Friars' three even-strength goals. Through his first four regular season games, the freshman left winger has a shorthanded goal for his lone point. (He had a goal apiece in each of two exhibition games, which of course do not count in either standings or statistics).

* Jay O'Brien: Unfortunately, the Flyers' other 2018 first round pick was unable to get into the act in Providence's win over BU. He remains sidelined with the upper body injury suffered midway through last Friday's game, when he was rocked on an illegal hit (charging) in a game against UConn. He sat out the third period of that game, did not play last Saturday and missed the BU game as well. He is, however, officially day-to-day and it believed the injury he incurred was to his shoulder rather than being a head injury. O'Brien had scoring chances but no points through his three-and-a-half games played to date.
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