Seven losses in a row for the first time since 2019’s eight-game losing streak. The Philadelphia Flyers, for lack of a better word, are just plain bad. I can pull out the thesaurus and use every synonym known to man but it still wouldn’t do it any justice. For all the flack that the coaching and defense is getting, rightfully so might I add, the offense has reached a point of no man’s land that no one could have ever imagined.
The skeptics would have told you that because the Flyers didn’t change much of their offensive personnel, that the scoring woes would continue. However, even the strongest and most stringent disbeliever would have never thought the Flyers would have scored 34 goals in an 18 game stretch, 25 goals in their last 14 games, 18 goals in their last 11 games, and 7 goals in their last 5.
No matter how you look at this stretch, not once did they ever look threatening with the puck. The Flyers have only scored 3 goals three times in their last 17 games and they have yet to eclipse more than 3 goals since their win against the Edmonton Oilers on October 27th when they won 5-3.
No more can people say that it’s too early in the season to be worrying about their scoring issues. No longer can people point out that they still have a good to great record even with scoring issues. No longer can we keep relying on the near perfect yet unrealistic goaltending we had to begin the season.
Scoring 7 goals in a 5 game stretch is bad but it’s manageable and almost every team goes through a short slump like that. However, we are talking about a stretch of games that goes back to the month of October, where they can’t even average 2 goals per game.
You go down the list and first and foremost, no one has a point per game average. Claude Giroux is tied with the team lead in goals (7) and points (18). After that Sean Couturier has 14, Cam Atkinson has 12, Derick Brassard has 11 in 4 less games, Joel Farabee has 10, Travis Konecny has 10, Ivan Provorov has 8, James van Riemsdyk has 6, and Oskar Lindblom has 1.
Cam Atkinson and Joel Farabee are tied in goals with Claude Giroux at 7, Sean Couturier and Travis Konecny have 5, Derick Brassard and Scott Laughton have 4, James van Riemsdyk has 2, and Oskar Lindblom has 0.
You examine these numbers even further and you realize that Giroux has 6 points in his last 11 games with only 2 goals in that span. Couturier has 0 goals and 2 assists in his last 11 games, Cam Atkinson had 6 goals and 1 assist in his first 5 games and since then he has amassed 1 goal and 4 assists in the next 16 games.
The list continues, as Travis Konecny has 1 goal and 1 assist in his last 12 games, Joel Farabee started the season with 3 multi point efforts in 3 games, then scored 1 goal and 0 assists in the next 14 games before scoring in 3 straight. James van Riemsdyk has gone goalless in 8 games and has 0 assists in his last 11. Scott Laughton and Oskar Lindblom weren’t supposed to break the bank in terms of scoring but Lindblom is still without a goal and only has 1 assist, while Laughton has 1 goal and 1 assist in his last 13.
The Flyers offense works best and is high flying when the defensemen are activated and this summer they went after several defensemen with the knack of scoring points. Fast forward 21 games into the season and Justin Braun still leads the defensemen in points with 8, Provorov is tied with Braun but should have way more than 8, Travis Sanheim has 3 assists, Keith Yandle has 5 assists, and Rasmus Ristolainen has 4 points.
Provorov has actually done well in recent games compared to his teammates as he has recorded 4 points in his last 6, but in the previous 15 games he only recorded 1 goal and 4 points. Sanheim hasn’t recorded a point in 13 games and is still searching for his first goal. Yandle recorded 5 points in his first 3 games, nothing in his last 18. Ristolainen has 1 point in his last 7.
Defensemen aren’t supposed to score goals, that much is obvious, but these are all capable 40+ point earners who are scoring at a pace that will land them in the 20s, if they’re lucky.
Yes, injuries to Kevin Hayes and Ryan Ellis have hurt the Flyers, but they have capable players in the lineup that should be scoring more than 1.89 goals a game, collectively. It’s rare to see an entire team struggling and in the midst of long scoring slumps and droughts together. Usually it’s a few players or at most a handful of players; not an entire team.
The power play has been the biggest sore spot for this team and most likely the biggest anchor in terms of their scoring woes. They are 5 for their last 57 attempts, they have as many shorthanded goals as power play goals in the last 2-3 weeks, and even though they had several good chances, they failed to convert on a pivotal 5-minute major in Wednesday’s game. Confidence is at an all-time low, they have tinkered with the personnel units on a game by game basis, and they are pressing.
They are pressing because they aren’t scoring and vice versa and by the looks of things, it isn’t going to get any better. Their entries into the zone are bad at 5-on-5, but they’re just as bad with the man advantage. They have trouble in the neutral zone so they end up dumping the puck in with no one chasing.
Penalty killing units have had it very easy this season because the Flyers can’t even set up properly. They have their players in positions that doesn’t suit their playing style, like van Riemsdyk playing behind the net instead of being planted right in front of the goalie.
They have 8 power play goals all season, and you could almost count the players who scored those goals on one hand. Before their game against the New York Rangers they were 26th in goals (2.45), 18th in shots on goal (30.9), 28th on the man advantage (13.1%), and 26th in shooting percentage (7.9%). Not only can they not score goals, they have trouble shooting the puck, scoring efficiently, and scoring when they have an extra skater on the ice.
Missing Hayes, Ellis, and even Wade Allison has hurt the Flyers, but they got good enough production from Brassard to acquiesce some of that missing second line firepower. A lot of other teams have fared worse with injuries, like the Pittsburgh Penguins who have been without Evgeni Malkin all season and Sidney Crosby for parts, and the Washington Capitals have been without Nicklas Backstrom all season and T.J. Oshie and Anthony Mantha for parts.
Now that their lineup, offensively speaking, is almost to full strength, the Flyers really need to dig deep and find the scourge of their issues before it’s too late. Seven straight losses on top of the fact that they haven’t played good hockey since their win against the Edmonton Oilers should scare anyone and everyone.
Their next 5 games are in a span of 7 days and they have 2 sets of back to backs to deal with. Possibly the worst back to back ever created in the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Colorado Avalanche, followed by the New Jersey Devils, and then finishing off in style on the road against the Vegas Golden Knights and Arizona Coyotes. 7 games already in the books, is it possible that the losing steak extends to 10 games and beyond? The way they’re scoring, there’s a very good chance of that happening.
Chuck Fletcher mentioned that he is going to be patient and try to weather the storm. Definitely not what you want to hear from your boss, but he knows better than anyone else that the Flyers have no wiggle room to acquire new players or to make any moves due to cap constraints, and the mere fact that their players hold very little value at the moment.
He is of the mind that the return of the injured players will be the catalyst that gets this team moving, but with Joel Farabee leaving Wednesday’s game early and being out week-to-week, they didn’t make much inroads in terms of getting healthy even as Kevin Hayes finally made his return to the lineup.
Morgan Frost has played well since his call-up, Wade Allison is still a week or so away as he gets acclimated to playing hockey after a long layoff, Ryan Ellis is on the mend indefinitely, and Derick Brassard is still day-to-day. Patrick Brown is also still out with a thumb injury.
If Fletcher is actually going to wait a few more weeks, then everybody within this organization needs to strap up their boots and realize it’s gut check time, because the schedule is doing them no favours either. Their season is already hanging in the balance 21 games in, and if they continue to plummet in the standings and if their offensive woes continue, it’s not only going to be a long off-season but it’s going to be a long regular season as well. Instead of the terrible, albeit shortened, 56 game schedule from last season, we have to deal with this team for the full 82 this time around.
