The Flyers are set to take on the Boston Bruins as round robin play gets underway.
The playoffs are officially underway in both Toronto and Edmonton. A handful of team begun their qualifying round games on Saturday. Along with a few more today, round robin play will also begin in each conference. That includes an afternoon matchup for the Flyers.
They will open up with a game against the Boston Bruins. This is the first of three games the Flyers will play in the next week. It is all to determine their seeding for the first round of the playoffs. Currently, Philadelphia is ranked as the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference.
Boston is the top seed in the East after another 100-point season. It was the third straight season they went over that mark. Always a powerhouse in the league, the Flyers will no doubt once again have their hands full.
They did take the season series, two of the wins coming in the shootout. They also faced the Bruins backup in Jaroslav Halak in those wins. And the Flyers will end up facing him once again.
Tuukka Rask was absent from practice on Saturday. His status as of after that practice was filled with uncertainty. Bruce Cassidy mentioning speaking to his veteran goaltender later that day to check his status. Turns out that conversation must not have gone well as Rask will be unavailable for this afternoon’s game.
Boston did get some good news on the injury front as Brad Marchand was cleared to play later on. He was injured during the team’s exhibition loss to the Blue Jackets. He will re-join the always dangerous David Pastrnak and Patrice Bergeron on the top line.
Each have performed well against the Flyers in their career. Bergeron leads the way with 36 points in 50 games against Philadelphia. Marchand is closer to a point-per-game average with 28 points in 34 career games. Pastrnak is the closest with 15 points in 16 games.
There are no surprises on the Philadelphia side. While Brian Elliott is expected to start one of the upcoming games, it will not be this one. Carter Hart will open things up for the Flyers.
The players in front of him will look similar to that of the last chunk of games. Alain Vigneault liked what he saw and will be using that group going forward. It will include seeing Joel Farabee and Shayne Gostisbehere out of the lineup.
Noted Boston killer Claude Giroux will be in the lineup, though. While he didn’t post any points in the series this year, he has a career 29 points in 39 games against the Bruins. Jakub Voracek also has had success against Boston, posting 27 points in 31 career games.
So it’s the Flyers leaders that will look to steer the ship in the opening game of round robin play. The team can only go up from here as they will try to get things rolling early on.