John Tortorella, Flyers Face Johnny G and the Jackets
By Scott Cole
The Flyers came home after a three game road trip, and topped the St. Louis Blues. Now, they hit the road again for Ohio to take on the lowly Columbus Blue Jackets to attempt to extend their winning streak to three games. Two of the NHL’s lowest scoring teams do battle in a matchup that someone has to win. And this matchup greatly favors Philadelphia.
The Blue Jackets are on a five game losing streak, where they have been outscored 28-8. Yeah…you read that right. That’s an average of 5.6-1.3. Ouch! And the way it is looking, as long as Columbus is in our division, the Flyers won’t finish in last.
This is also the first time that John Tortorella will go against the Blue Jackets, the last team he previously coached. He is Columbus’ all-time winningest coach with 227 wins in six seasons and four playoff appearances. He was let go following the 2020-21 season after the Blue Jackets finished in last place.
Philadelphia Flyers
Record: 7-3-2 (16 points, 4th in Metro)
After dropping the Blues, the Flyers offense looks like it is clicking a little bit. This time, the flurry of goals came from their younger players: Wade Allison, Noah Cates, and Owen Tippett all found the back of the net. Travis Konecny added a goal as well.
Lukas Sedlak, who is looking more like the greatest waiver pick up in years for the Flyers, scored his first goal of the season. His fourth line accounted for two of the goals in the game and is starting to become one of the more consistent lines for the Flyers.
The Flyers are 30th in the NHL with goals, but that’s ok with Tortorella. This is a defensive minded team first. They are second in the league with goals given up at 29. Only Winnipeg (28) has given up less. This emphasis on defense has helped keep the Flyers competitive in pretty much every game so far.
And they will need that competitiveness. Carter Hart was dealing with an illness but is expected to be between the pipes. Hart’s been solid all season so far, so his absence, normally would be bad. But with the Flyers facing the Blue Jackets after facing the Blues, this comes as an opportune time for Felix Sandstrom. Sandstrom stopped 27 of the 28 shots he faced. If Hart isn’t able to go after all, Sandstrom could easily fill that role.
Projected Lineup
Owen Tippett – Kevin Hayes – Travis Konecny
Joel Farabee – Scott Laughton – Wade Allison
Noah Cates – Lukas Sedlak – Zack MacEwen
Nicolas Deslauriers – Morgan Frost – Tanner Laczynski
Ivan Provorov – Tony DeAngelo
Travis Sanheim – Justin Braun
Nick Seeler – Rasmus Ristolainen
Carter Hart
Columbus Blue Jackets
Record: 3-9-0 (6 points, 8th in Central)
They were supposed to be better than this. They made a big offseason splash by signing the hottest free agent in the last few years: Johnny Gaudreau. The South Jersey product was expected to make the roster in Philly, New Jersey, or the Islanders. He shocked the hockey world by going to Columbus because of the fans….and the cannon. He was expected to bring a lot of firepower to a team that had some young talent and could go places. That hasn’t come close to happening.
And as expected, Johnny G is leading the team with points…just nine with five goals. Sadly, those five goals are 17% of all the goals scored (30) for the Jackets. Kent Johnson has three goals. Eight players have two goals, including stud defender Zach Werenski and speedster Patrik Laine. Former Flyer Jakub Voracek has one goal, but is tied for the team lead with five assists. All of this puts the Jackets at 31st, next to last, with goals scored.
Voracek has been sidelined in the last game with an upper body injury and will miss tonight’s game as well. Not only that, but Laine is day to day with an illness and center Sean Kuraly, who has scored two goals so far this year after posting up a career high 14 last year, is out with an upper body injury.
Besides the lack of scoring, this is a bad team overall. They are second to last in goals against (55), worst on power play (6.5%), and fourth in penalty minutes (92). At least they are 14th overall in penalty kill (78.9%) when you consider how much they are down a player, but then again the number might be skewed because of how many times they are on the penalty kill. Maybe Johnny G should’ve chosen better!
Their goaltending isn’t much better and whoever the Flyers face, it should be good for our guys. Elvis Merzlikins has played in the most games and is 2-5 with a 4.82 GAA and a .863 save percentage. Daniil Tarasov is 1-3 with a 3.57 GAA and a save percentage of .893.
You hate to say “kick ’em when he’s down”, but this is a team the Flyers need to step all over. By all means this should be an easy win. Not only that, it is a divisional rival. Any time you can take on and defeat a team in your own division, no matter the record, it is a good thing. The Flyers need to stay competitive with good teams, but they need to beat the bad teams. They couldn’t do that last year. Hopefully this year they can. This is shaping up to be a very winnable game for Philly.
Projected Lineup
Johnny Gaudreau – Boone Jenner – Patrik Laine
Gustav Nyquist – Jack Roslovic – Emil Bemström
Eric Robinson – Cole Sillinger – Yegor Chinakhov
Liam Foudy – Brendan Gaunce – Mathieu Olivier
Zach Werenski – Nick Blankenburg
Vladislav Gavrikov – Andrew Peeke
Jake Bean – Erik Gudbranson
Joonas Korpisalo
Where, When, and How to Watch/Listen
Time: 7 PM
Where: Nationwide Arena
Watch: NBC Sports Philadelphia
Radio: 97.5 FM
Live Stream: Fubo Tv
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