One of the few bright spots in this new season for the Flyers has been Matvei Michkov. He has been everything advertised so far. The 19-year-old has six points in seven games. There have been just seven teenage rookies in Flyers history to record six points in their first seven games: Eric Lindros, Peter Zezel, Travis Konecny, Bob Kelly, Rich Sutter, and Justin Williams. That's a pretty good company to be in.
In seven games, he has three goals. If we extrapolate that for a full season, that is just shy of 40 goals. The last Flyer to score 40 goals was Jeff Carter who scored 46 in 2008-09. The closest anyone has gotten to 40 was Scott Hartnell's 37 in 2011-12. The interesting thing about Michkov's three goals is that they have all come on the power play.
You may not be that impressed by three power-play goals, but if we put what Michkov has done in the first two weeks of his rookie season into last year's stats, he'd be tied for third with Morgan Frost, Sean Couturier, and Bobby Brink and just two goals shy of Owen Tippett's five goals for the team lead. Again, that was for all of last season. His three power-play goals also tie him for the NHL lead with four others.
Likewise, three of Michkov's four assists on the season have come on the man advantage. That means, for the year thus far, Michkov has six total power-play points. Again, as far as the 2023-24 season goes, Frost had the team lead of eight assists. Frost led the Flyers with 11 total power-play points last season. Michkov is already halfway there.
It is no secret that the Flyers' power play has been virtually non-existent over the last few years. So far, the Flyers are right near the upper tier of power play teams at 11th with a 24% scoring rate on the man advantage. Likewise, their penalty kill ranks second at an 89% rate. Last year, they finished the season fourth on the penalty kill, but last place in the league with a paltry 12% on the power play.
Michkov seems like a great player in the making. He is young and there is room to grow. It would be great to see him start to score five-on-five. However, if he keeps collecting goal after goal on the power play, I'll take it. It was the one thing that this team had been missing for years: a sniper on the power play. If they can keep utilizing his talent, perhaps they can start collecting some wins too.