The Philadelphia Flyers will begin a four-game road trip tonight at T-Mobile Arena against the Vegas Golden Knights, and tonight they will let Tony DeAngelo take the night off as he’ll be a healthy scratch for this one.
Cam York, who was recalled from AHL Lehigh Valley yesterday, will suit up for the first time this season after failing to make the Flyers’ roster out of training camp.
DeAngelo may still be banged up a bit, as he did miss one game after a hard shot block on Black Friday against Pittsburgh and he has largely played on the third pair since returning instead of on his usual post next to number-one defenseman Ivan Provorov. Regardless, the Flyers have felt that he’s struggled a bit as well and are giving him at least tonight off.
York draws in after playing 20 games with Lehigh Valley, where he’s recorded three goals and ten assists for 13 points with the Phantoms. He’s seemed to find confidence in his game and he had been performing well with Lehigh Valley before his first recall of the season.
While the Flyers are looking to rebound from Wednesday’s loss against Washington against a much tougher and better opponent tonight in Vegas, perhaps York can provide an extra boost to the defense tonight in his season debut.
On the Golden Knights’ side of things, they’ve been chugging along as well as any team in the league this year. Despite missing the playoffs for the first time in franchise history last year on top of losing star starting goaltender Robin Lehner for the season, they have not missed a beat so far this year. They’ve received production all throughout their lineup and have gotten incredible goaltending from Logan Thompson, who is tied for tenth in the league in save percentage (.910). Don’t sleep on Adin Hill either, who boasts the tenth-best goals against average in the NHL (2.55) and will man the Vegas crease tonight against Philadelphia.
While the Golden Knights have played extremely well, they will still be without defenseman Alex Pietrangelo and could also be missing center Jack Eichel, two of the league’s superstars and two of Vegas’ best players. Pietrangelo is currently away from the team attending to a family matter, while Eichel has missed the last two-games with a lower-body issue. Eichel was present at Vegas’ optional skate today and is a game-time decision for tonight.
PHI Record: 9-13-5, 23 pts, 7th in Metropolitan
VGK Record: 19-8-1, 39 pts, 1st in Pacific
Last Game PHI: 12/7/22, 4-1 L vs. Washington
Last Game VGK: 12/7/22, 5-1 L vs. NY Rangers
When: 10:00pm ET
Where: T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas, NV
PHI Goalie: Carter Hart (8-8-4, .911 SV%, 2.79 GAA, 0 SO)
VGK Goalie: Adin Hill (6-2-1, .908 SV%, 2.55 GAA, 0 SO)
PHI Projected Lineup
#49 Noah Cates – #13 Kevin Hayes – #11 Travis Konecny
#21 Scott Laughton – #23 Lukáš Sedlák – #86 Joel Farabee
#25 James van Riemsdyk – #48 Morgan Frost – #74 Owen Tippett
#44 Nicolas Deslauriers – #38 Patrick Brown – #17 Zack MacEwen
#9 Ivan Provorov – #55 Rasmus Ristolainen
#6 Travis Sanheim – #61 Justin Braun
#45 Cam York – #24 Nick Seeler
#79 Carter Hart
#32 Felix Sandström
VGK Projected Lineup
#43 Paul Cotter – #20 Chandler Stephenson – #61 Mark Stone
#19 Reilly Smith – #71 William Karlsson – #81 Jonathan Marchessault
#46 Jonas Røndbjerg – #15 Jake Leschyshyn – #8 Phil Kessel
#28 William Carrier – #10 Nicolas Roy – #55 Keegan Kolesar
#3 Brayden McNabb – #27 Shea Theodore
#23 Alec Martinez – #2 Zach Whitecloud
#14 Nicolas Hague – #42 Daniil Miromanov
#33 Adin Hill
#36 Logan Thompson
PHI Injuries: Sean Couturier (back), Bobby Brink (hip), Ryan Ellis (hip), Wade Allison (hip), Tanner Laczynski (upper-body)
Scratched: Cam Atkinson, Max Willman, Tony DeAngelo
VGK Injuries: Jack Eichel (lower-body), Brett Howden (lower-body), Nolan Patrick (upper-body), Robin Lehner (upper-body)
Scratched: Alex Pietrangelo, Ben Hutton, Michael Amadio
News and Notes:
– Egor Zamula was sent down to Lehigh Valley yesterday in place of Cam York.
– This will be meeting number nine between Philadelphia and Vegas since the Golden Knights entered the league in 2017. The Flyers have a 5-3-0 advantage in the series.
– Travis Konecny enters tonight on a four-game point streak and has registered points in 13 of his last 15 games (6g, 11a).
– The Flyers have only lost once in their previous four contests at T-Mobile Arena, back on January 2nd, 2020 by a score of 5-4. Philadelphia is one of the few teams that have yet to be truly intimidated by what they call “The Fortress”.
Broadcast Info: TV – NBC Sports Philadelphia, Radio – 93.3 WMMR
