Following a mind-numbing 3-0 loss to the Vancouver Canucks in the home opener on Saturday, the Philadelphia Flyers have stumbled to a 1-3-1 start to the 2024-25 season.
After nearly qualifying for the Stanley Cup playoffs last season, expectations were higher for the Flyers this season.
Matvei Michkov joined the crew, Ivan Fedotov had a full offseason to acclimate himself, and some of the young regulars were expected to take steps forward.
So far, none of that has mattered.
The Flyers are on a four-game losing streak and currently own a .300 points percentage, the fourth-worst number in the NHL.
They’re also the only team in the Metropolitan Division without a regulation or overtime (ROW) win this season.
Through the first five games of the season, here’s what I’m thinking about the Flyers so far:
Ivan Fedotov or Alexei Kolosov?
You can argue that Ivan Fedotov’s two games with five goals against have cost the Flyers four points so far this season.
You can’t argue that, even for his struggles, he hasn’t pulled off some brilliant saves to match them.
With Fedotov, it looks like a technique thing and a comfort thing. Navigating through traffic looks like a totally foreign concept to him. Sometimes, you’ll see the 6-foot-8 goalie trying to extend his neck trying to look over guys when he can already see over them.
The problem is that he needs to look around them, not over them. Fedotov wastes too many movements in his crease for a guy who already isn’t very nimble.
His potential replacement, Alexei Kolosov, has not been any better with his play this year.
Kolosov is by far the superior athlete and excels in the areas Fedotov does not, but he hasn’t shown his best at the AHL level.
Through his three starts with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, Kolosov is 1-2-0 with a 3.06 GAA and a .878 save percentage.
We are going to find that Fedotov has a longer leash in net than we thought this time last week.
Jett Luchanko needs to play more
Through his first four NHL games, 18-year-old rookie Jett Luchanko has played only 76 shifts, according to NHL Stats.
That’s an average of 19.0 shifts per game. Garnet Hathaway, Joel Farabee, Bobby Brink, and Noah Cates (only one game played) are the only Flyers averaging fewer shifts per game.
Travis Konecny, Matvei Michkov, Owen Tippett, and Morgan Frost lead the way in average ice time for forwards, with all averaging 18 minutes or greater. Tyson Foerster is next in the 16s, followed by a huge gap, followed by Luchanko at 14:03.
And then there’s everybody else in the 13s or lower.
If the plan is to develop Luchanko’s offensive game and get him some different looks, it has not worked so far. Playing hot potato at the center position is not going to help the kid feel comfortable or confident.
Get him on the ice or send him back to Guelph and let him dominate the OHL.
Where is Emil Andrae?
The Flyers called up Emil Andrae on Oct. 11 to replace rugged defenseman Nick Seeler, who was placed on injured reserve the same day.
Since then, the 22-year-old Andrae has played a grand total of zero games.
Andrae’s biggest calling card is his puck-moving ability; he scored five goals, 27 assists, and 32 points in 61 games for the Phantoms last season. The Swede also had two goals in his six Calder Cup playoff games with the Phantoms, and each came on the power play.
Egor Zamula has had 10 of his shot attempts blocked this season, which leads the Flyers’ defensemen by a large margin. Travis Sanheim is the next closest with five, and Jamie Drysdale is right behind him with four.
The difference is that Sanheim (sometimes) and Drysdale are out there to score points. Zamula just doesn’t have the same mobility or skillset, but he is ironically used as the quarterback for the second power play unit because of his perceived ability to get pucks to the net.
Veteran Erik Johnson, the de facto seventh defenseman, leads Flyers defensemen in turnovers with five.
Defensively, Johnson actually hasn’t played poorly at all. But his gusto with the puck on his stick left him a long time ago, and, right now, it is hurting a Flyers team that exclusively creates offense in transition or on the power play.
Surely it wouldn’t hurt to give Emil Andrae a shot instead of making him sip a coffee in the press box every night.
What is the plan for Noah Cates and Nick Deslauriers?
Five games into the season, Noah Cates and Nick Deslauriers have combined to play in a single game.
That game was courtesy of Cates, who logged 11:28 of ice time and one shot on goal in 15 shifts in the 6-3 Oct. 12 loss to the Calgary Flames.
For a long time, it has been my belief that the Flyers’ best lineup is not the one that has Cates in the press box. Head coach John Tortorella continues to say he wants to see more offense from Cates, but never plays him.
When Cates does play, it’s in low-leverage, defense-oriented minutes with other fourth-liners, like Ryan Poehling and Garnet Hathaway. Ironically, that trio was the Flyers’ best line for the last three months of the 2023-24 season.
Tortorella has apparently thrown that idea in the garbage two weeks into the 2024-25 season.
In Thursday’s 6-4 loss to the Seattle Kraken, we saw Michkov get boarded by Brandon Montour, which went unpunished by the referee. Later in the game, Travis Konecny had his head rammed into the plexiglass by Brandon Tanev.
Nobody on the Flyers responded.
Konecny had to get his own revenge, and even then, he ended up fighting with Yanni Gourde, not Tanev.
Is this not the whole point of having Deslauriers on the roster? Guys choosing not to make a statement on the ice is a problem on its own, but at least with Deslauriers, that’s effectively his only job.
He can’t do that when he is left out of the lineup entirely.
