The rebuilding Philadelphia Flyers shocked and surprised the hockey world with their blistering start to the 2023-24 campaign. With how bad they were in 2022-23, the myriad of question marks heading into the new season, and a roster that was bereft of talent, there was a lot of work that needed to be done – and John Tortorella and his coaching staff went to work.
Despite the many positives that could and should be taken out of the entire campaign, it’s unfortunate that it was marred by the collapse in the final weeks of the regular season. The epic collapse was culminated by an 8-game losing streak where they decided to not show up against the lowly Chicago Blackhawks, Columbus Blue Jackets, and twice to the Montréal Canadiens.
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Had they won just one of those four games, it would have set up and a win-and-you’re-in Game 82 against Washington instead of needing help from a lot of teams and a regulation victory to seal the deal; which forced them to pull their goaltender in a tie game.
The highs were high, the lows were low, and as always there a lot of controversial topics and decisions being made by the coaching staff headed by Tortorella. The Flyers lost Carter Hart after the Hockey Canada investigation came to light, they were forced into trading Cutter Gauthier after he refused to play for the club, their newly named captain went through an ugly 30-game stretch without a goal, and their rookie goaltender played 32 of the final 36 games of the season among so much more.
However, we also saw Owen Tippett score a career-high 28 goals, Travis Konecny beat out his career high from last year with 34 goals of his own, Cam York became the 1D we needed, Travis Sanheim bounced back after a nightmarish 2022-23, and the penalty kill was phenomenal for most of the season and led the league in shorthanded goals.
How the Season Unfolded
When the puck first dropped, the Flyers finished the first month of the season going 4-4-1 in the month of October before rattling off records of 7-6-1 and 8-2-3 in the months of November and December, respectively, giving them a respectable 19-12-5 record heading into the New Year. They struggled coming out of the gates in January with a 6-7-1 record but bounced back in a big way in February with a 6-3-1 record.
Heading into the hectic month of March where they were going to play 15 games in a stretch of 30 days, including a gauntlet with two games each against Toronto, Florida, and Boston as well as games against the New York Rangers, Carolina, and Tampa Bay, they were holding onto a stable record of 31-22-7. The Flyers limped out of the month with a 5-7-3 record and holding onto their playoff spot by the slimmest of margins.
The 8-game losing streak from the 24th of March to the 9th of April really took the wind out of their sails. They didn’t just lose to Chicago, Montréal, Columbus, and Buffalo; they were blown out of the water in most of those games. Montréal outscored them 13-4, Chicago came into the Wells Fargo Center and baffled the Flyers with a 5-1 victory, and Buffalo spoiled Ivan Fedotov‘s first career start before the severely battered Blue Jackets scored 6 goals – all from defensemen – the following day.
While it came down to the final day of the season, their 4-month hold onto the third and final spot in the Metropolitan Division fell into enemy hands with the New York Islanders taking advantage of the vulnerable and wounded. Overall, 38-33-11 is a lot better than their 31-38-13 record from last season but considering how well they played from October to February, it was disappointing to see the wheels fall of as ferociously as they did.
Offense
2023-24 was the fifth consecutive season that the team’s leading scorer did not have more than 70 points and the fourth time in five years where they didn’t average over a point-per-game. Travis Konecny has led the team in points four times out of the last five seasons, with last year’s 61 points in 60 games being the only time that they’ve had a point-per-game player since Claude Giroux’s 85 points in 2018-19.
The offense has been a consistent problem for quite some time, even going back to the Giroux days. At least back then they had a functional power play, which balanced out with their atrocious even-strength play. Now it’s the complete opposite where the Flyers are one of the better even-strength scoring teams but possess a historically bad power play – one that has finished in last place for 3 straight seasons.
The Flyers ranked 27th in goals scored with 231, ranking ahead of just Washington (216), Seattle (214), Anaheim (203), San Jose (180), and Chicago (178). They were just one of 11 teams that failed to average 3.00 goals per game or more throughout the season (2.82), and scored a league-worst 31 power play goals – 40 less than Tampa Bay – while having the 9th-most power play attempts (254). But the saving grace were the shorthanded goals as they scored a league-best 16.
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Even-strength was the Flyers’ bread and butter as they ranked 9th in the NHL in xGoals % (51.91%), 8th in Corsi % (51.61%), 4th in Fenwick % (54.08%), 5th in shots on goal (2,083), 3rd-best in shots on goal against (1703), and were top-10 in score adjusted expected goals % and score and flurry adjusted expected goals %.
Ironically enough, despite all their shots on goal and chances, they finished with the 11th worst high danger shots for (159), middle of the pack in medium danger shots for (486), and 3rd in low danger shots for (2335)
How the top-10 stacked up:
Travis Konecny: 33 goals and 68 points in 76 games
Owen Tippett: 28 goals and 53 points in 78 games
Joel Farabee: 22 goals and 50 points in 82 games
Travis Sanheim: 10 goals and 34 points in 81 games
Morgan Frost: 13 goals and 41 points in 71 games
Scott Laughton: 13 goals and 39 points in 82 games
Sean Couturier: 11 goals and 38 points in 74 games
Tyson Foerster: 20 goals and 33 points in 77 games
Cam York: 10 goals and 30 points in 82 games
Cam Atkinson: 13 goals and 28 points in 70 games
From a player’s perspective, it was a tough season as almost every single player went through a lengthy drought. Konecny was once again the cream of the crop as he was able to bury 33 goals on the season, despite a lot of line shuffling and inconsistencies from his teammates. His worst stretch was early in the season from the 30th of October to the 25th of November where he tallied just 4 points in 13 games. Conversely, his best stretch came in between December 4th to January 6th where he scored 9 goals and 19 points in 15 games.
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Players like Morgan Frost had positive stretches but also quite a bit droughts. He ended the season with 4 goals and 14 points in 26 games, which included 1 goal and 1 assist in his final 11 and going pointless in his last 6 games. Joel Farabee started the season hot with 40 points in 48 games before finishing off with just 10 in his final 34 games, Cam Atkinson finished the season without a point in his final 23 games and went through a 26-game stretch in the middle of the year without a goal. Sean Couturier had 30 points in first 41 games before finishing off with just 1 goal and 8 points in his final 33 games.
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There were some positives despite the myriad of struggles. Players like Ryan Poehling and Garnet Hathaway really solidified the Flyers’ third line alongside Noah Cates but the problem became magnified when they were given 16-18 minutes a night because the rest of the team was mired in cold streaks.
With Couturier and Atkinson either being demoted down the lineup or sitting in the press box, Tortorella put a lot of faith in his grinders to push the Flyers ahead and while they had individually good seasons – based on their past and track record – it wasn’t enough to propel the offense as expected. They desperately need a frontline superstar, or at the very least a borderline superstar to keep things afloat at the top of the order.
Defense
It was always going to be a bag of mixed tricks with the Flyers’ back-end, especially after moving on from Ivan Provorov. York and Sanheim had a lot to prove heading into the 2023-24 season, there were question marks regarding Sean Walker and Nick Seeler, Rasmus Ristolainen was starting the year on IR again, and then there were questions regarding how the bottom pair would round out with the likes of Emil Andrae, Egor Zamula, and Marc Staal in the mix.
At the top, York went from 2 goals and 20 points in 54 games last year while averaging 19:39 to 10 goals and 30 points in a full-82 game season while averaging 22:37. He blocked 174 shots, finished 76 checks, and fired 134 shots towards the net. Sanheim went from 7 goals and 23 points in 81 games while averaging 20:24 to 10 goals and 44 points in 81 games with 23:48 ATOI. It made a lot of sense for the latter to have won the Barry Ashbee Trophy for team’s best defenseman, while the former won the Pelle Lindbergh Memorial for being the most improved.
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Walker and Seeler performed exceedingly well from October to March and were in the headlines constantly as being two of the top trade targets heading into the trade deadline. There were lots of discussions taking place between team and player in regards to extensions as well, but ultimately the Flyers flipped Walker to Colorado for a first round pick, while keeping Seeler around for the next three seasons on an extension. Walker had 22 points in 63 games with a plus-9 rating in 19:36 ATOI for the Flyers and bounced back in a big way after a horrific injury just 2 seasons before.
Zamula had an above-average season, considering it was his first full year with the club after sporadically playing over the last 3 years. He finished with 21 points and a plus-3 rating in 16:03 ATOI while adding 79 blocked shots to 37 hits to go along with 2 power play goals and 9 power play points. Staal only appeared in 35 games and averaged a career-low 13:49 ATOI but even when he managed to find his way into the lineup, it was nothing to write home about.
Ristolainen spent a lot of time on the mend for the third straight season but looked to have finally found his confidence again on the third pair and averaging just under 17 minutes. He came into Philadelphia with too much pressure, not knowing his role, and was thrusted into a top-pair role almost immediately. However, under Tortorella and Brad Shaw they were able to fine tune his game a lot better; unfortunately he ended up missing the final two months of the season.
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The Flyers also acquired Jamie Drysdale midseason after the shocking trade that sent Gauthier to the Anaheim Ducks. The oft-injured defenseman was just coming off an injury before being traded from the Ducks and ended his season on the mend as well after missing a month with a shoulder injury.
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He returned for the final stretch but did not look anywhere near the same player, and we found out at the end-of-season presser that he will more than likely have to undergo core surgery to fix whatever is ailing him. Drysdale has all the tools to be a fantastic offensive defenseman, he just needs to find a way to stay healthy. Drysdale is the key to the malignant power play and hopefully he’ll be ready for the 2024-25 season.
The Flyers acquired Erik Johnson at the trade deadline and were forced into using Ronnie Attard and Adam Ginning after Ristolainen, Drysdale, and Seeler were placed on IR and Walker was on the move. The two prospects from the Lehigh Valley Phantoms did relatively well in their short time with the big club and Johnson had his moments, but it was another Staal-esque experiment that didn’t necessarily bear much fruit.
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Heading into 2024-25, the Flyers have several options to choose from but once again it seems that the prospects are going to have battle for the final spots after a not-so-great season down in the Phantoms. York, Sanheim, and Drysdale figure to be at the top of the totem pole with Seeler right behind them. Ristolainen and Zamula should clear the top-6 but should they not be included they have Attard, Ginning, and Andrae to choose from and potentially a Walker-reunion – which could very well be in the cards.
Goaltending
After a fantastic start to the season from both Hart and Samuel Ersson, the wheels fell off with the former no longer available. Hart was 12-9-3 with a 2.80 GAA and a .906 SV% and at that time Ersson was admirably filling in as the 1B with a 15-5-3 record, a .911 SV%, and 2.25 GAA. In fact, taking his horrid start out of the equation, Ersson was 12-3-2 with a .930 SV%, 3 shutouts, and a 1.82 GAA leading into the 20th of January – Hart’s final game.
After that, Ersson went 11-14-4 with a .875 SV% and GAA over 3.00 with 1 shutout. He played almost every game down the stretch with Felix Sandström and Cal Petersen not even being viable options to help out. From the 1st of March to the 9th of April, Ersson went 4-7-3 in 15 games with an .852 SV% and 50 goals against. He was run into the ground and was having issues with even just the routine stops that he was making with relative ease back in December and January.
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The final stretch without Hart was so bad that the Flyers ended the season with the worst save percentage in the league at .884. To put that into even more perspective, the Flyers allowed the 2nd-least amount of shots in the entire league at just 2,225 – behind just Carolina. They went from being 25-14-6 to 13-19-5 in the final stretch, including a 9-14-5 run from the 15th of February.
Fedotov was thrusted into immediate action, something Tortorella wanted to avoid but felt like he had no choice with how poorly Ersson was playing at the moment. Fedotov did an amazing job in relief of Ersson in his first taste of action but looked absolutely bamboozled in his first career start a couple days later against Buffalo. He couldn’t track the puck, he was moving very slowly from post-to-post, and was about a step or two behind the Sabres’ offense.
Samuel Ersson: 23-19-7/2.82 GAA /.890 SV%/4 shutouts
Carter Hart: 12-9-3/2.80 GAA/.906 SV%/1 shutout
Cal Petersen: 2-2-0/3.90 GAA/.864 SV%
Felix Sandström: 1-2-0/3.87 GAA/.823 SV%
Ivan Fedotov: 0-1-1/4.95 GAA/.811 SV%
Next season should be a whole lot different in the sense that Fedotov will have had a lot more time to acclimate to North America and Ersson will not need to play every single game down the stretch. They can both equally split things up like a general 1A/1B tandem but the Flyers should definitely look into a far more capable third option with Petersen and Sandström no longer being viable options.
Special Teams
The power play was horrible. There’s no other way to describe it. We’re talking about a man advantage that has now finished at the bottom in three consecutive seasons and it’s only getting worse. The Flyers scored the least amount of power play goals (31) while having the 9th-most power play opportunities (254) for a disastrous end result of 12.2%.
In an era where teams are scoring well above 3 goals a game and where a successful power play unit is clicking at above 20% on a regular basis, the Flyers have not caught up with the trends. The Tampa Bay Lightning led the way with 71 power play goals, 8 teams scored more than 60 times with the man advantage, and 19 teams scored 50+ power play markers. The Flyers were essentially 20 goals short of that mark – which would have done them a huge favour in the overall standings.
League-wide, Sam Reinhart led the way with 27 power play goals, followed up by Leon Draisaitl’s 21, and Kirill Kaprizov and Steven Stamkos’ 19. Nikita Kucherov led the way with 40 power play assists and 53 power play points in total, Nathan MacKinnon had 48, Connor McDavid and Artemi Panarin had 44, Kaprizov had 41, and J.T. Miller and Mikko Rantanen each had 40.
For the Flyers, Tippett led the way with 5 power play goals, followed by Konecny and Tyson Foerster at 4, and then Frost, Couturier, and Bobby Brink each had 3. Frost paced the club with 11 power play points, Konecny and Zamula had 9, Tippett and Foerster had 8, and Couturier and Farabee had 7.
There were 33 players who scored more or just as many power play goals as Frost had power play points to lead the Flyers. Frost was 168th in the NHL in power play points, Konecny was 199th, Foerster was 211th, Tippett was 213th, Couturier was 226th, and Farabee was 237th. Tippett’s 5 power play goals had him ranked 134th.
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This was a power play that went 6 for their last 62 (9.6%) dating back to March 1st, 14 for 117 (11.9%) going back to January 15th, and 21 for 173 (12.1%) going back to December 4th. The Flyers finished the regular season having gone 0-for-23 in a stretch of 9 games and it’s not surprising that they went 2-6-1.
For when the power play lacked, the penalty kill made up for it – for a majority of the season. The wheels fell off on their stout penalty killing unit after the Sean Walker trade, but they still finished 4th in the league with an 83.40% success rate to go along with a league-leading 16 shorthanded goals. They allowed the 5th-least amount of power play goals (40) and they were shorthanded 241 times, good for 19th in the NHL.
Up until that disastrous game in Tampa Bay where the Flyers were soundly defeated 7-0 and allowed two power play goals in the first half of the first period, the Flyers had only allowed 27 goals on 201 attempts, which was good for 86.9% and first place in the league. They finished the last 18 games of the season having given up 13 goals on 40 attempts; a massive drop off at 67.5%.
They only went seven games without allowing a power play goal in that stretch and the ironic part is that they were committing less and less penalties by the end of the season. They had a clean game in Montréal and against Washington and only committed two minor penalties or less an additional seven times. Plucking Walker out of the equation and the injury to Seeler just made things infinitely worse, but it shouldn’t have been that bad.
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With a power play going 5-for-52 (9.6%) and a penalty kill at 27-for-40 (67.5%), it’s no wonder they slumped to a 5-10-3 record at the end of the season. The 16 shorthanded tallies were great and they even scored 7 times shorthanded in a 26-game stretch, but your penalty kill should never be more lethal than your power play.
The Flyers had a special teams quotient under 100 for yet another season, even with their penalty kill sitting in the top-4. They finished with a paltry 95.6 compared to the Carolina Hurricanes, who had 113.34 to lead the charge. The Lightning were at 111.96, the New York Rangers had 110.9, and the Los Angeles Kings were at 107.16 – a stark contrast to the Flyers.
Special teams let them down time and time again and it was one of the key contributing factors to the fallout of their fantastic start to the season. The power play was powerless for the entire year while the penalty kill crumbled at the most inopportune time.
Overall, the Flyers exceeded expectations, but it’s just unfortunate how the season came to a close. For many – myself included – it was the first time since at least 2019-20 that this team gave us a sense of hope, belief, and actual expectations. After years of mediocrity and a severely porous on-ice effort, this rendition of the Flyers not only played with heart and soul, but most importantly they had an identity instilled within them. Not since the Mike Richards-era have the Philadelphia Flyers had an outbound identity, something they could cling onto for a full 82-game grind, or something that other teams knew they were going to get every time the Orange and Black stepped onto the ice.
John Tortorella brought that jam and had it not been for their meltdown in the final weeks of the regular season, we would have been treated to playoff hockey within the confines of the Wells Fargo Center for the first time since 2017-18.
