The Flyers hit the midway mark of the season when they took on the Maple Leafs on Tuesday night. And through 41 games, there is still plenty of evaluating to do.
"We have defined our style of play, I think we're pretty comfortable how we're going to play," John Tortorella said on Tuesday morning. "I think some guys have steadily improved. I think some guys have put themselves in the conversation of still being evaluated. And that's a big part of what this year is about."
The Flyers are 17-19-5 halfway through the season. At this point last year, they were 22-14-6. They surprised many last season as they fought for a playoff spot until the very last day. Philadelphia sits three points out of a playoff spot. With 39 points, a division spot is likely out of the question as the closest team in the Hurricanes has 50 points.
It's going to take more consistent play from up and down the lineup for the Flyers to make a second-half run. Tortorella is aware of where this team is at in the third year of his coaching tenure.
"Uneven in the first half. Some really good stuff. Some stuff [where] we lose ourselves a little bit. But it's nothing shocking to me. It's a constant evaluation on all the players as we continue to move forward here."
One of those areas of evaluation is the Flyers' goaltending. Tortorella didn't mince words at the beginning of the season when he said that position "scares the crap out of him" regarding their options.
"Each day I wake up and I'm not sure where [the Flyers goaltending] is at, the way it's gone so far. But that's something we're trying to iron out."
Sam Ersson is in his first season as the team's starting goaltender. He's also missed 16 games and counting due to various injuries. The Flyers have had to rely on two rookie goaltenders to carry most of the load. Aleksei Kolosov has 11 games under his belt. Ivan Fedotov now has 12 games.
Both have shown promise at times, but also show their lack of experience. The Flyers are at the bottom of the league when it comes to goaltending. They are 30th when it comes to goals against per game (3.54). With a combined .877 SV%, the Flyers are last in the league.
Among qualified goaltenders, Ersson is 40th with a 3.02 GAA. Kolosov is 50th with a 3.45 GAA. To put that into perspective, 51 goaltenders have played at least 31.25% percent of their teams' games, the stat needed to show up on this list.
"I think I was pretty honest at the beginning of the year where we were at," Tortorella said. "We did not expect this. Ers, we're force-feeding him. Now we have two other guys coming from Russia, coming over, in the picture a lot quicker than we ever thought they would be. When Carter left, that threw this into turmoil. It is what it is, we've lived with it, we continue to live with it and we do the best we can.
The Flyers have had to carry three goaltenders on their roster for a large majority of the season. It's not ideal, as Fedotov can attest to best. He went over a month without a start when the Flyers went with Kolosov as the backup goaltender.
"No one foresaw this. I think a lot of people kind of run it down a little bit, 'What are they doing?' No one foresaw this was going to happen as you develop your team and you develop probably your most important position. We thought we'd have more time with Ers, to develop him. He gets thrown into it and now with his injury problems here of late, it has turned into even a little bit more of a situation. So we just keep banging away."
Tortorella has long preached a defensive structure. But the Flyers are trying more and more to take risks in the offensive zone to make up for things. They are scoring 2.98 goals per game, good for 19th in the league. The top team in the Washington Capitals has 3.70.
They'll keep banging away as Tortorella said. We'll see what the second half holds for this team.