The Philadelphia Flyers are back home for the second leg of a back-to-back as they host the Ottawa Senators on Saturday night at Wells Fargo Center.
The Flyers are coming off a sloppy 5-2 loss against the Washington Capitals on Friday, in which they scored the first two goals of the game before the Capitals rattled off five unanswered on just 21 shots on goal.
It was a game that had major playoff implications with the Flyers holding the third and final spot in the Metropolitan Division, but the Capitals leapfrogged themselves into fourth and are now only five points behind Philadelphia.
“I think it was a wasted opportunity to take over and move up in the standings,” said captain Sean Couturier. “That’s too bad, but we’re still right there. We’ve just got to think about tomorrow now, forget about this one and go get two points tomorrow.”
“We’re gonna get on the train, get home, and get ready to play our next game,” said head coach John Tortorella. “As we talked about prior to this game, it’s each day at a time and we’ve got to try to be better tomorrow.”
Well, they couldn’t have picked a more enticing opponent to be better against in the Ottawa Senators.
The Senators have lost three in a row, they’re 15th in the Eastern Conference, and you might as well call them the Titanic of the NHL since they’re comfortably at the bottom of the Atlantic.
That being said, Ottawa took the first two meetings of the season against the Flyers rather easily, winning 5-2 on October 14th at Canadian Tire Centre and 5-3 on January 21st at Wells Fargo Center. Hopefully, the Flyers are actually prepared this time around for a team that’s supposed to be deemed inferior.
And in playing Ottawa for the third and final time this season, the Flyers will likely have a new goaltender looking to beat them after Carter Hart and Samuel Ersson lost the prior two matchups. Felix Sandström is expected to start tonight after being recalled from AHL Lehigh Valley on Thursday. Cal Petersen struggled in his recall so now it’s Sandström’s turn to stake his claim as the full-time backup.
The 27-year-old Swede is 11-6-2 with an .882 SV% and 3.23 GAA with the Phantoms this season and is 3-16-4 with an .887 SV% and 3.62 GAA in 25 career NHL appearances. Sandström has faced the Senators once before, stopping 41 of 46 shots in a 5-4 overtime loss last season on March 30th, 2023.
PHI Record: 31-23-7, 69 pts, 3rd in Metropolitan
OTT Record: 25-30-3, 53 pts, 8th in Atlantic
When: 7:00pm ET
Where: Wells Fargo Center, Philadelphia, PA
Broadcast Info: NBC Sports Philadelphia, 97.5 The Fanatic
Last Game PHI: 3/1/24, 5-2 L at Washington
Last Game OTT: 3/1/24, 5-3 L vs. Arizona
PHI Goalie: Felix Sandström (11-6-2, .882 SV%, 3.23 GAA, 0 SO w/AHL Lehigh Valley in 2023-24)
OTT Goalie: Mads Søgaard (1-1-0, .825 SV%, 5.09 GAA, 0 SO)
PHI Projected Lineup
#86 Joel Farabee – #48 Morgan Frost – #10 Bobby Brink
#74 Owen Tippett – #21 Scott Laughton – #71 Tyson Foerster
#27 Noah Cates – #25 Ryan Poehling – #19 Garnet Hathaway
#44 Nicolas Deslauriers – #14 Sean Couturier – #89 Cam Atkinson
#8 Cam York – #6 Travis Sanheim
#24 Nick Seeler – #26 Sean Walker
#5 Egor Zamula – #18 Marc Staal
#32 Felix Sandström
#33 Samuel Ersson
Scratches: #23 Ronnie Attard, #62 Olle Lycksell
Injuries: #9 Jamie Drysdale, #11 Travis Konecny, #55 Rasmus Ristolainen
OTT Projected Lineup
#19 Drake Batherson – #18 Tim Stützle – #28 Claude Giroux
#7 Brady Tkachuk – #57 Shane Pinto – #91 Vladimir Tarasenko
#21 Mathieu Joseph – #71 Ridly Greig – #81 Dominik Kubalík
#27 Parker Kelly – #12 Mark Kastelic – #17 Zack MacEwen
#85 Jake Sanderson – #2 Artem Zub
#72 Thomas Chabot – #24 Jacob Bernard-Docker
#6 Jakob Chychrun – #26 Erik Brännström
#40 Mads Søgaard
#35 Leevi Meriläinen
Scratches: #50 Maxence Guenette
Injuries: #9 Josh Norris, #23 Travis Hamonic, #31 Anton Forsberg, #70 Joonas Korpisalo
News and Notes
– Philadelphia is 51-39-8-9 all-time against the Senators and 30-17-2-4 at home against them.
– The Flyers have not defeated the Senators since November 5th, 2022 – a span of five meetings.
– Cam Atkinson leads all active Flyers in goals (12) and points (21) against Ottawa, while Rasmus Ristolainen leads in assists (13).
– Former Flyers captain and icon Claude Giroux has recorded at least a point in every single contest against them as a member of the Senators. He has 3 goals and 5 assists for 8 points in 5 games against the Flyers with Ottawa.
– Mads Søgaard only has one victory in goal for Ottawa this season. The opponent he beat? The Flyers back on January 21st at Wells Fargo Center.
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