Flyers return to the ice Thursday vs New York Rangers

The Philadelphia Flyers are set to play an actual NHL hockey game for the first time in 11 days following a week long quarantine. That being said, the team is still heavily undermanned.

The last time we saw the Flyers they were in the midst of trouncing the Washington Capitals 7-4 and seemed to finally be finding their rhythm. But as we know, the hockey gods are fickle and the team was stricken with their first real bout with COVID of the season.

From Travis Sanheim to Travis Konecny, the Flyers saw a total of eight players wind up on the COVID-19 protocol list, leaving the NHL no choice but to postpone a handful of games.

However, the team has made it through the woods (fingers crossed) and will resume their season Thursday night vs the New York Rangers — albeit with a less-than-complete roster.

Flyers Expected Lineup

The Flyers will still be without the services of Claude Giroux, Jake Voracek, Justin Braun, Scott Laughton, Oskar Lindblom and Travis Konecny on Thursday. Winning is never a sure thing in the NHL and the task becomes even more difficult when you’re without three of your leading scorers and a couple more extremely important role players.

Obviously, with so many players out, the team that will be taking the ice looks…a bit different. During Wednesday’s practice, the team ran the following lines:

Forwards

JVR – Couturier – Farabee

Raffl – Hayes – NAK

Bunnaman – Patrick – Kase

Morin – Andreoff – Sushko

Defense

Provorov – Myers

Sanheim – Ghost

Hägg – Gustafsson

At first glance…woof. That 4th line is about as unappealing as when Dave Hakstol used to trot out Chris VandeVelde and Bellemare for 15 minutes a night. Also, the 3rd defensive pairing is still pretty ugly. That being said, it isn’t all doom and gloom.

James Van Riemsdyk and Joel Farabee should be able to create offense at will alongside Sean Couturier. The Hayes line looks like a formidable forechecking threat, and consists of three of the teams best “swiss army knife” players, capable of playing in any situation at either end of the ice.

Beyond that, this is a big opportunity to Nolan Patrick to be the play driver on his line and step his game to the next level. David Kase and Connor Bunnaman are not slouches, but in order for that line to be successful, Patrick will have to lead the way. Kase has shown a knack for being in the right place at the right time during his brief stint with the team last season, so perhaps he can work some magic with the highly-skilled Patrick.

As far as the 4th line goes, fans should enter the game with the lowest of expectations and perhaps hope to be pleasantly surprised as the game goes on. Sam Morin didn’t have the best audition in his first game on the wing and Andy Andreoff is an AHL forward at this point in his career.

This line does serve as a nice chance for fans to see Maksim Sushko a little closer though, as he may be a prospect most fans don’t immediately think of when they envision the Flyers of the future. Sushko has excelled on the World Juniors stage and appeared to be settling in with the Phantoms last year. Like I said, it’s unreasonable to expect too much from them under the circumstances, but they might just surprise us.

Keys to the game

1) Slow down Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad

As these two go, the Rangers go. Panarin is picking up right where he left off last year, recording five goals and 15 points in 12 games thus far. While Zibanejad has struggled to match his torrid scoring pace from last season — he has just three points in 14 games — he’s the type of player that can break out at any moment. If the Flyers stand any chance of winning this game with their depleted lineup, keeping the two of them in check is a necessity.

2) Exploit the Rangers defense

The Rangers are a mess defensively. Between a lack of skill on the back end (outside of Adam Fox), a major injury to Jacob Trouba and a failure to play a structured team game, the Rangers often hemorrhage high-quality chances in their own end.

If the Flyers can establish a consistent forecheck similar to what they did in their previous five games before the COVID pause, they will create chances. Furthermore, the Flyers must capitalize on opportunistic chances created by turnovers, because those moments will happen vs the Rangers team.

3) Strong game from Carter Hart

This is perhaps a key to victory every time the Flyers play. Carter Hart would probably be the first to say that he hasn’t played his best this season. Personally, I think more of that has to do with the team’s play in front of him, but I digress.

When Hart is locked in, the Flyers can win games that they have no business being in and they’ll probably need that level of play Thursday as well given the lineup they’ll be icing.

The Rangers aren’t an elite team, but they play a fast and loose style and have a handful of players that can strike off the rush for opportunistic goals.

If Hart can do his part and stop the shots he needs to have and allow the new additions to the lineup to settle in, the Flyers should be able to take care of business down the other end of the ice. Hopefully Hart doesn’t need to be the best player on the ice, but if he is, that bodes well for the team.