The Line Between Young And Dumb Is A Thin One For The Flyers

It has been a trying start to the season for the Philadelphia Flyers, who were a surprise playoff team last year with one of the league’s youngest rosters. Their impact players are still basically all 25 and younger, so some growing pains were to be expected. But things started brutally on Day 1 and haven’t gotten much better: at 3-7-4 they are last in the East, despite having played more games than anyone else.

The young fellas are mostly getting their goals—Trevor Zegras, Matvei Michkov, and Porter Martone are top three on the team in points; Denver Barkey, in his first full season, is still scuffling a bit—but there’s more to NHL success than scoring. That’s the message head coach Rick Tocchet is trying to drill into his charges. Even a slightly better record in overtimes (0-4, only one of those reaching a shootout) would have the Flyers sitting a little prettier, but they are proving less than adept at protecting the puck. Yes, a scoring chance looks very appealing at 3-on-3, but the Flyers skaters are acting like they’ve forgetten that the puck can go the other way.

Consider Tuesday night at home against Columbus. The Blue Jackets jumped out to a 3-0 lead, but Philly dominated the rest of regulation and roared back to tie the game with 11 seconds left. Then, in overtime, Michkov got stripped soon after entering the attacking zone, something that can’t happen as the trailer. Cole Sillinger and Zach Werenski went the other way on the juiciest 2-on-0 you’ll see see (until 30 seconds later), and only a nifty Dan Vladar stop kept the game alive.