The presents got unwrapped, the cookies were eaten, and the holiday break concluded, meaning hockey has returned to action. The Philadelphia Flyers (19-10-7) resume their season on the West Coast to take on the Seattle Kraken (15-14-6) at Climate Pledge Arena with the puck scheduled to drop at 8:00pm ET.
Philadelphia comes out of the break riding a two-game winning streak and securing a point in eight of their last nine contests. The Flyers’ offense is starting to feature a slew of players finding themselves on the scoresheet resulting in the team beginning to crawl out of the basement in goals scored per game with 2.94, 20th-best in the league.
Travis Konecny recorded two points in Philadelphia’s 3-1 defeat over the Chicago Blackhawks last Tuesday night. Trevor Zegras stayed scorching hot by adding an assist in the matchup to extend his point streak to nine games. The Flyers have depth in scoring too as of late. Fourth liner Carl Grundström has netted five goals in nine outings since being recalled following Tyson Foerster’s injury, including a tally in a 5-2 victory against the Vancouver Canucks which featured Philadelphia’s fourth line having a combined five points.
“They’re flying around. They’re getting in on the forecheck and kind of tilting the ice for us,” Noah Cates said about the fourth line. “It’s huge and it gets us going.”
The Flyers have won the first game back from the holiday break over the last four seasons. If all four lines maintain their current status producing offense, and if the Flyers perform without showing signs of Christmas fever, they should be able to extend their post-holiday win streak to five games.
“Hopefully the maturity, leadership, and things like that take a hold of this,” Rick Tocchet said on the key of coming out of a long break. “For me it’s the little things… what you’re doing off the draw, a lot of shots early, if you got the puck in a pretty good scoring chance like shoot it. Don’t try to overpass because that’s when you get in trouble when you have three or four days off.”
Philadelphia’s opponent in Seattle appears to have turned a corner around the halfway mark of the season. The Kraken shifted an embarrassing stretch of hockey from late November to mid-December when they dropped 10 of 11 matchups and were outscored 44-22 into what is now a three-game winning streak. The Kraken jumped out in front in those three contests similarly to when Seattle and Philadelphia met back in October, which the Flyers would come back to win 5-2.
Despite their recent success, the Kraken are at the bottom of the ocean in terms of goals scored (89) and their penalty kill (70.3%). Both give the Flyers a huge advantage as the Orange and Black have found the back of the net three times in their last three games on the power play. The Flyers also limited their oppositions to 99 goals so far,’which is fourth-lowest in the NHL.
A lot of credit goes towards Dan Vladař, who should be between the pipes for the Flyers. Vladař is 7-1-2 with a .911 SV% and averaging 2.40 goals against per game over his previous 10 starts. He has 13 wins on the year, one shy of a career high.
The Flyers haven’t won in Seattle since Dec 21, 2021. Martin Jones was in net that night and stopped 34 of 36 shots.
Philadelphia’s Injury Report:
Seattle’s Injury Report:
- Jaden Schwartz (lower-body)
- Brandon Montour (hand)
- Matt Murray (lower-body)
Philadelphia’s Player to Watch: Owen Tippett
These past few performances from Tippett have been put on noticed. He netted a pair of goals across his three prior outings, including a highlight reel worthy tally on Thatcher Demko last Monday night. Tippett generated 10 scoring chances in that matchup with Vancouver and there seems to be growing chemistry with rookie Denver Barkey, who set up Tippett on his goal in New York last Saturday. Tippett also scored twice when these two teams first played this season.
Seattle’s Player to Watch: Eeli Tolvanen
He’s not necessarily the Matty Beniers or Jordan Eberle-caliber player that comes to mind when thinking of the Kraken, but Tolvanen has manufactured points on Seattle’s top line with banged up bodies out of the lineup. Tolvanen carries seven points in his last five games heading into the matchup with the Flyers.
Philadelphia Projected Lineup:
#46 Trevor Zegras – #22 Christian Dvorak – #11 Travis Konecny
#52 Denver Barkey – #14 Sean Couturier – #74 Owen Tippett
#39 Matvei Michkov – #27 Noah Cates – #10 Bobby Brink
#91 Carl Grundström – #18 Rodrigo Ābols – #29 Nikita Grebenkin
#8 Cam York – #6 Travis Sanheim
#24 Nick Seeler – #55 Rasmus Ristolainen
#36 Emil Andrae – #9 Jamie Drysdale
#80 Dan Vladař
(#33 Sam Ersson)
Seattle Projected Lineup:
#84 Kaapo Kakko – #10 Matty Beniers – #7 Jordan Eberle
#20 Eeli Tolvanen – #9 Chandler Stephenson – #89 Frederick Gaudreau
#77 Berkly Catton – #51 Shane Wright – #19 Jared McCann*
#12 Tye Kartye – #59 Ben Meyers – #63 Jacob Melanson
#29 Vince Dunn* – #6 Adam Larsson
#55 Ryan Lindgren – #8 Cale Fleury
#41 Ryker Evans – #24 Jamie Oleksiak
#35 Joey Daccord
(#31 Philipp Grubauer)
