Daniel Brière, Keith Jones, and Dan Hilferty deserve their flowers for how well the Philadelphia Flyers have performed this season, shattering all expectations and looking like an actual playoff team as we enter the Christmas break.
However, the man commandeering the ship seems to be John Tortorella – at least with the on-ice product – and he deserves the most praise for how he took a downtrodden group and resurrected them into a hard-to-play-against, competitive, resilient team that has the hockey world on notice.
This organization was in peril, they were a ship without a captain, and they came as close to sinking as they’ve ever come in franchise history. The last few seasons might have even been worse than the dreaded 2006-07 campaign where they finished dead last in the league with the worst record – in franchise history as well – and lost out in the Patrick Kane sweepstakes to the Chicago Blackhawks.
It was always apparent that there was something wrong with the makeup of the team, whether that was the on-ice product, the coaching staff, or the upper management; something was rotten. It was extremely odd that with every passing regular season and subsequent offseason, we constantly heard from media members, upper management, and the players themselves that accountability was lacking and confidence was at rock bottom.
They had Paul Holmgren, Ron Hextall, and Chuck Fletcher as their respective general managers and a slew of head coaches from Peter Laviolette, Craig Berube, Dave Hakstol, and Alain Vigneault. They all had different visions, mentalities, and philosophies, yet somehow we ended up in the very same position every year.
Tortorella entered the fray and because of his fiery past with the Tampa Bay Lightning, New York Rangers, and Columbus Blue Jackets, assumptions were quickly formed. The very misunderstood head coach came into the messiest of situations with one goal in mind: rebuilding the once great reputation that was held about Philadelphia hockey.
He never strayed from his philosophies and from day 1 he made it abundantly clear that everyone was on the same playing field and standing. Contracts, the previous seasons, and reputation was thrown out the window and if you weren’t willing to commit, then your stay in Philadelphia might be shortened.
The tough love approach received a lot of backlash, primarily from the national media as they were zeroing in Kevin Hayes and Tony DeAngelo. Fans weren’t entirely pleased either, some believed Tortorella was going to run Joel Farabee out of town after his agent presumably spoke up about his client’s role with the club, and plenty prominent members took to Twitter to disparage Tortorella for his lack of belief in Morgan Frost earlier this season. However, the results are what matter most and Tortorella has eradicated the lack of accountability, the laziness, and the ineptitude with effort, competitiveness, and a system wrapped around a culture and an identity.
His player development arch has been the biggest storyline because he has turned around the careers of Rasmus Ristolainen and Nick Seeler. He’s helped Sean Walker and Owen Tippett, he’s been responsible to some degree from the evolution of Travis Konecny, Noah Cates, and Travis Sanheim and he’s given players like Samuel Ersson, Scott Laughton, and Cam York the opportunities to rise.
Ristolainen’s acquisition was not met with open arms and at times was seen as the black sheep and scapegoat. It was hard to argue against that train of thought because at times Ristolainen looked lost, out of position, and didn’t seem to understand his role – or even have a role to begin with. Tortorella entered the conversation and after making strides last season in the positive direction, the hulking Fin has looked even better this season and some teams have been bold enough to call Daniel Brière to talk about his trade availability. What was once an immovable contract, has now turned into a conversation starter for the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Seeler was another player who looked worse for wear during the 2020-21 season when he was anchored next to Keith Yandle or Kevin Connauton. The trio represented a very weak link on broken back-end and with Yandle essentially retiring and Connauton not extended, Seeler remained and turned his career around last year. The veteran defenseman took an entire year off after the 2019-20 COVID-interruption and wasn’t sure he’d ever play again. Fast forward to 2023-24 and not only has he become of the most reliable shot blocking defensemen in the league but several contending teams have inquired about his availability, some of whom are willing to acquire his services for a 2nd round pick.
Konecny has become a foundational pillar after years of being dragged in trade conversations, Tippett has found a new home in Philadelphia after a rough start in Florida, York is coming into his own as a top pair defenseman, Sanheim has become the alpha on the back-end, Ersson’s play has afforded the Flyers to own one of the best tandems in the entire league, and the list goes on and on.
Even by just comparing the 2022-23 Flyers to the 2023-24 teams there’s a vast difference at this exact juncture of the season:
| As of December 21st |
2022-23 Flyers |
2023-24 Flyers |
| Record |
11-15-7 |
18-11-3 |
| Goals Scored |
82 |
95 |
| Goals Against |
109 |
85 |
| Shots For |
975 |
1042 |
| Shots Against |
1059 |
908 |
| Power Play |
15/98 (15.3%) |
11/102 (10.2%) |
| Penalty Kill |
74/94 (75.5%) |
88/102 (86.3%) |
| CF% |
46.4 |
49.8 |
| FF% |
47.8 |
51.4 |
| PDO |
98.3 |
99.7 |
When asked about the possibility of making the playoffs, Tortorella was quick to dismiss the question because that was not something that was on his mind.
I’m sure the same would be said if someone brought about the conversation of winning the Jack Adams Award as the best coach in the league. It’s been a very long time since a Flyers bench boss has taken home the honours, with Vigneault coming close in 2019-20. The Flyers are in a 4-way tie with the most winners for the Jack Adams Award with Fred Shero taking home the honours in its first year in 1973-74, Pat Quinn in 1979-80, Mike Keenan in 1984-85, and Bill Barber being the most recent in 2000-01.
Tortorella has taken home the honours twice in his illustrious career, with the first time coming back in 2003-04 with Tampa Bay and then again in 2016-17 with Columbus. If the Flyers’ success continues then there should be no reason why he doesn’t take home his 3rd Jack Adams Award.
The expectations were exceedingly low from every outlet you could think of. The Hockey News’ Adam Proteau posted his predictions and believed the Flyers had the best shot at winning the draft lottery and that by Christmas they should be “well out of the playoff race, causing an even faster tear-down.”
“19. Who will have the best odds of winning the NHL draft lottery?
I voted for: Philadelphia
Why I voted for them: Most voters – 18 in total – picked the San Jose Sharks in this category. Six of us picked the Flyers, tying them with the Anaheim Ducks for second place. I like Philly here because they’re tearing things down the right way. By Christmas, they should be well out of the playoff race, causing an even faster tear-down. They’re also in the toughest division in hockey. That should make them the league’s worst team.”
The Hockey Writers took their stab at things during the off-season as well believing that the Flyers would come in last place by a wide margin:
“The Columbus Blue Jackets and Philadelphia Flyers are almost certain to be the bottom two teams in the division but are trending in opposite directions. The Blue Jackets have a chance to surprise some people, but they aren’t quite ready to jump up into the playoff race. The Flyers are still in the middle of their rebuild and with Danny Brière taking over as general manager, his fingerprints have already started covering the rebuild and he isn’t afraid to make moves.”
The Athletic believed the Flyers were going to be a bottom-3 club with the San Jose Sharks, Anaheim Ducks, and tied with the Montreal Canadiens.
The list is endless and it’s not to say that we actually thought the Flyers would be this good but there was almost no chance that they were going to be in the same stratosphere as San Jose and Chicago. Nevertheless, that point seemed to get swept under the rug in nearly every single prediction and apparently that has fuelled their electric run so far.
We also can’t forget to acknowledge Brad Shaw who deserves a lot of credit for helping the back-end and being in charge of the 4th-best penalty kill in the NHL. He has done a fantastic job as Tortorella’s right hand man this season and their prior chemistry is on full display in Philadelphia.
Another important nugget of information is Tortorella possibly taking on a managerial position in the future. Elliotte Friedman mentioned it shortly after Chuck Fletcher was relieved of his duties that the ownership group sees Tortorella as part of the future – indicating that a front office position could be in the cards.
The Cam & Strick Podcast echoed those very same sentiments a few days ago that the Flyers could potentially bring back Craig Berube once Tortorella makes his way into the press box. He spent a lot of time there at the end of last year when Brière took over as interim general manager and just based on his verbiage, he has always looked to the future instead of just focusing on the present.
Tortorella has turned the ship around and has made the Flyers an enjoyable watch again. 2020-21 to 2022-23 seemed like an eternity, just one long never-ending nightmare with no end in sight. The present is bright, the future is even brighter, and a big part of that is because of their bench boss.
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