It hasn’t been the start of the season that anyone wanted for the Philadelphia Flyers but just 6 games into the 2024-25 campaign and we’ve seen more line juggling than ever before, which could and should be a cause for concern.
It’s been a very long time since the Flyers have been an offensive juggernaut. Outside of their interrupted 2019-20 season, you’d have to go back to 2017-18 at the earliest. 2024-25 wasn’t supposed to be a groundbreaking year, nor were the Flyers expected to be an offensive machine, however their even-strength play has taken a nose dive and several marquee players are struggling to create much of anything.
John Tortorella has put his lines through a blender on several different occasions – within the same game. We’ve witnessed 18 different line combinations to start a game and he’s tried just about every single one of them with the exception of Matvei Michkov playing with fourth liners.
One of the more puzzling ones concerns Flyers’ captain Sean Couturier. He started the season with Michkov and Travis Konecny and by the second period he was playing with Bobby Brink and Joel Farabee on the third line. He’s seen time with Garnet Hathaway and Ryan Poehling, he’s been with Scott Laughton and Noah Cates, but he’s also spent time with Owen Tippett and Michkov.
The Flyers are currently 30th in the league’s standings, ahead of just the Nashville Predators and the San Jose Sharks. They are tied for last in goals scored with the New York Islanders and the Sharks with just 13, and 6 of them have come from their special teams.
At least to start the season, their special teams are clicking as they hold a power play that’s connecting at a 20% clip and a penalty kill that’s successful 88.46% of the time. Unfortunately, their offensive play at 5-on-5 – which was a strength last year – has dwindled and they are currently 6th-last in shots with just 170 and 5th-last in shooting percentage with a paltry 7.6%.
They’re not allowing very many shots, which is reminiscent to their gameplay last year, with just 179 allowed thus far, but they’re not saving very many either as they own the third-worst save percentage at .860.
Currently only one player on the roster has a plus-rating in Poehling as he leads the team at plus-1 and then following him are Hathaway and Cam York at even. Jamie Drysdale, Yegor Zamula, and Farabee are at the bottom of the list with ratings of -9, -8, and -7, respectively. There are 3 players at -6, one player with a -5 and a -4 rating, and 3 players each with ratings of -3 and -2.
That in it of itself should be a strong indication of their paltry even-strength play. While they’ve taken a whopping 26 minor penalties, they’ve only allowed 3 goals and their power play, which was horrid for years, has scored almost half of their early season total.
Another issue is that the defensemen have scored 4 goals and bottom-6 players have tallied another 4 themselves. Meaning that the top-6 which would generally encapsulate the likes of Michkov, Konecny, Tippett, Morgan Frost, and Tyson Foerster have combined for 5 with Michkov and Konecny tallying 2 apiece.
Tippett and Couturier have just 1 assist to their names, Frost has 3, and Konecny only has 1 himself to further punctuate the point.
Another annoying trend and habit is that the Flyers’ top players tend to pass off too many shooting or scoring opportunities. While Frost and Tippett have combined for 0 goals on 36 shots, you have Konecny operating with a 12% shooting clip, Michkov with an 18.2% success rate, Laughton at 20%, and Foerster at 11.1%.
While it’s too early to really look at shooting percentages, it’s still a good indication that these players aren’t getting enough rubber to the net despite how successful they’ve been to start the season.
Then you look at the analytics and according to moneypuck.com, the Flyers are 6th-last in Corsi and expected goals percentage, 9th-last in Fenwick, dead last in expected goals for, 7th-last in expected goal differential, 4th-last in goals differential above expected, 2nd-last in PDO, 3rd-last in shooting percentage on shots on goal, and the list goes on and on.
It’s still very early in the season to completely come down on the Flyers, but it’s certainly frustrating watching the offense put up donuts on a game by game basis. Their claim to fame under Tortorella was how hard they played, their forechecking and back-checking, blocking shots, and giving the opposition a run for their money. They’re not really doing any of those things with the exception of blocking shots.
Perhaps it’s as easy as simplifying the game and going back to the basics with their 5-on-5 line combinations.
Farabee – Couturier – Konecny
Tippett – Frost – Michkov
Foerster – Luchanko – Brink
Laughton – Poehling – Hathaway
Rather than giving Couturier 5 different sets in 6 games, stick with a specific combination for a few games before truly assessing what’s working and what’s not. Building chemistry isn’t going to happen on the fly in the middle of the second period when you’re trailing by 1-2 goals and keeping Couturier toiling in the bottom-6 isn’t good for anyone.
While some have played together for several years now, they still need to time to adjust. Michkov can’t go from having Couturier and Konecny to Frost and Tippett mid-game and expect to understand the nuances of their skillset. We’ve seen countless moments to start the season, where Michkov is going one way and the puck or puck carrier is going the complete opposite direction.
At some point, Tippett will find the back of the net with ease, Konecny should be back to the near point-per-game he was at the last two seasons, and Michkov should get a lot more comfortable with the system and the NHL landscape. However, until then, it’s going to be a lot bumpier than expected unless things can change rapidly and from several different sources.
