The Philadelphia Flyers might be…good? The Orange and Black are already off to their hottest start to a season since 2011-12 at 3-0-0, and have a chance to go 4-0-0 for the first time since 1995-96 against the Florida Panthers tonight in Sunrise.
Philadelphia rallied for another comeback victory last night against the defending Eastern Conference champions and former back-to-back Stanley Cup-winning Tampa Bay Lightning. The Flyers trailed 2-0 in the game off two Steven Stamkos power play goals, but they stuck with their game plan and remained resilient. Scott Laughton buried an Egor Zamula rebound to get Philadelphia on the board, and then James van Riemsdyk and Noah Cates each scored in the third period to give the Flyers an impressive 3-2 victory.
The Flyers have played from behind and managed to win in all three games they have played now (1-0 vs New Jersey, 2-0 vs Vancouver, 2-0 at Tampa Bay), and while that isn’t the typical recipe for success and some things still need to be cleaned up on the ice, this team has some real urgency in their game and have not backed down from a challenge yet. For a John Tortorella-coached team, that should be expected, but it’s exciting to finally see that type of hockey being played in Philadelphia again.
The Florida Panthers come into tonight’s contest on the heels of their first loss of the season. After opening the season with road victories against the New York Islanders and Buffalo Sabres, the Panthers fell to the Boston Bruins 5-3 at TD Garden on Monday night.
Not only are the Panthers trying to rebound from a tough loss, they will have to do so without star defenseman Aaron Ekblad. The 2014 first overall draft pick was placed on LTIR today by Florida after suffering a lower-body injury in Monday’s game. The Panthers are also missing defenseman Brandon Montour, so that’s two key contributors in Florida’s top-four group out for tonight. Those two players are huge losses for the Panthers, and even more so when they’re already missing forward Anthony Duclair, who scored 31 goals last year for the club.
PHI Record: 3-0-0, 6 pts, 2nd in Metropolitan
FLA Record: 2-1-0, 4 pts, 4th in Atlantic
Last Game PHI: 10/18/22, 3-2 W at Tampa Bay
Last Game FLA: 10/17/22, 5-3 L at Boston
When: 7:30pm ET
Where: FLA Live Arena, Sunrise, Florida
PHI Goalie: Felix Sandström (season debut, 0-4-1, .910 SV%, 3.23 GAA, 0 SO in 2021-22 w/PHI)
FLA Goalie: Sergei Bobrovsky (1-1-0, .924 SV%, 2.61 GAA, 0 SO)
PHI Projected Lineup:
#21 Scott Laughton – #13 Kevin Hayes – #11 Travis Konecny
#25 James van Riemsdyk – #48 Morgan Frost – #58 Tanner Laczynski
#86 Joel Farabee – #49 Noah Cates – #57 Wade Allison
#44 Nicolas Deslauriers – #59 Jackson Cates – #17 Zack MacEwen
#9 Ivan Provorov – #77 Tony DeAngelo
#6 Travis Sanheim – #61 Justin Braun
#54 Egor Zamula – #24 Nick Seeler
#32 Felix Sandström
#79 Carter Hart
FLA Projected Lineup:
#23 Carter Verhaeghe – #16 Aleksander Barkov – #13 Sam Reinhart
#19 Matthew Tkachuk – #9 Sam Bennett – #38 Rūdolfs Balcers
#27 Eetu Luostarinen – #15 Anton Lundell – #6 Colin White
#94 Ryan Lomberg – #21 Nick Cousins – #70 Patric Hörnqvist
#42 Gustav Forsling – #7 Radko Gudas
#18 Marc Staal – #3 Matt Kiersted
#28 Josh Mahura – #32 Lucas Carlsson
#72 Sergei Bobrovsky
#30 Spencer Knight
PHI Injuries: Cam Atkinson (lower-body), Rasmus Ristolainen (undisclosed), Owen Tippett (upper-body), Sean Couturier (upper-body), Patrick Brown (back), Bobby Brink (hip), Ryan Ellis (lower-body), Artem Anisimov (PTO, lower-body)
FLA Injuries: Aaron Ekblad (lower-body), Brandon Montour (upper-body), Anthony Duclair (Achilles), Zac Dalpe (undisclosed)
News and Notes:
– This is the first of three meetings between the teams this season. The Flyers and Panthers will face off again next Thursday at Wells Fargo Center, and then they’ll finish their season series again in Philadelphia on March 21st.
– The Panthers boast three former Flyers in their lineup tonight: Nick Cousins, Radko Gudas, and Sergei Bobrovsky.
– A Flyers victory would not only give the team their first 4-0-0 start since 1995, but it would also put them in first place in the entire league for the time being.
– Philadelphia maintains a 55-36-7-6 all-time record against Florida since the Panthers joined the NHL in 1993.
Broadcast Info: TV – TNT, Radio – 97.5 The Fanatic
