Flyers VP of Athlete Performance and Wellness Ian McKeown joins Flyers Daily Podcast

Ian McKeown’s role as vice president of athlete performance and wellness for the Philadelphia Flyers is wide-ranging. The Flyers have staff members helping the players do everything – get ready for the game, measure their output during the game, and recover for the next game. Through the grind of an NHL season, with travel and back-to-backs and late nights, it’s an ongoing challenge. 

To that end, McKeown and his staff are looking for any edge they can find to help with the process.  Compare it to NASCAR – every week, there are at least 25 cars showing up that are going to run 200 MPH. The key to success is to find a way to run 200.5 MPH. So what’s the hockey equivalent of that?

One place the Flyers have tried this season is in recovery, where they have partnered with NexGen Hyperbaric to make hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) available to their players.

“Penn Medicine has a great hyperbaric medicine program, and we're lucky that our emergency doctors here that are actually part of that and lead that program,” McKeown said. “So we're a little bit aware of of the difference between something you’ve seen off the shelf and a true medicine, the potency of what we’re doing. So we're really going after that.”

Hyperbaric Medicine is known not only for accelerating recovery from physical injuries but also for enhancing mental clarity, improving cognitive function, and promoting overall wellness. This therapy can help the body recover more quickly, prevent future injuries, and sharpen mental performance—enabling athletes to not just heal but to thrive. By partnering with NexGen Hyperbaric and integrating medical-grade HBOT on-site, the Flyers are actively working to make their players healthier, stronger, and more resilient, taking performance and wellness to the next level.

“It's what is going to make these guys thrive in the NHL for a long period of time,” he said. “We're not here to be a flash in the pan. We want to be successful for a long period of time. And that that that means being sustainably good, and it's been able to take what sustainable high performance is across every single industry - whether that's Wall Street, whether that's medicine, whether that's academia, whatever it is, we’ve got to lean on that as well.”

But it’s not just the current players who are benefitting from the partnership. The Flyers are also making the treatment available to their alumni, as it can offer benefits from the long-term effects of a hockey career as well.  It’s a renewal of Ed Snider’s longstanding commitment to take care of the team’s players even after they’re done playing.

“You know, once a Flyer, always a Flyer,” McKeown said. “One of the great things I did early when I joined here was learn a little bit more about Mr. Snider's legacy, whether it's internally, with the staff that are still here, or with the alumni. There's nothing to be more proud of than the legacy and having people that you have had the pleasure of working with in a sport, and whenever you've been able to see them come back and be part of being able to look after them and being able to give them the support that they need after such a gladiatorial career."

To that end, McKeown has found that the staff at NexGen Hyperbaric have similar values. 

“The absolute highlight for me is the people around NexGen,” McKeown said. “Everyone from the technicians, which are on call 24/7 for our players, as well as their leadership, run by Jonathan Rotella who's been phenomenally supportive of us and my vision for the Flyers, but, and then the absolute pleasure of getting to know Jerry Rosburg relatively well over the time. He’s a Super Bowl winning coach, he speaks locker room language, he truly gets it. It's quite unique to have a high-end medical facility that has such a translator into sport. So we’re very lucky to have him, and I really value how we've been able to do to work together with them.”  

So while the Flyers are making inroads with NexGen’s technology, it’s not meant to be a short-term thing. McKeown and his staff are looking to build an approach that will be a lasting part of the team’s quest to win the Stanley Cup, and hyperbaric medicine is a big part of it.

"The support of the management team has been amazing, beginning with Dan Hilferty," said McKeown. "When it comes to the best care, cutting edge technology and any advantage we can give our staff and athletes, it's never a question with Dan. It's 'Let's do it!" That kind of commitment resonates and continues with Keith and Danny. It is so crucial to what we are building, which is long-term and sustained success."