5 THINGS: Flyers vs. Hurricanes

Interim head coach Mike Yeo's Philadelphia Flyers (15-25-9) will host Rod Brind'Amour's Carolina Hurricanes (34-11-4) in a Presidents Day matinee on Monday. Game time at the Wells Fargo Center is 3:00 p.m. ET (NBCSP, 97.5 The Fanatic). The game is also the Flyers' annual Pride Night.

This is the third of four meetings between the teams this season, and the second and final game at the Wells Fargo Center. The season series will wrap up in Raleigh at PNC Arena on March 12. The Flyers are 1-1-0 thus far against the Hurricanes.
On Nov. 12 in Raleigh, a spectacular 39-save goaltending performance by Carter Hart highlighted a 2-1 Flyers victory. Trailing 1-0 in the third period, the Flyers rallied for goals by Joel Farabee and Zack MacEwen to win the game. Outshot by a 28-13 margin through two periods, the Flyers generated a 15-12 shot advantage in the final stanza.
The teams rematched at the Wells Fargo Center on the afternoon of Nov. 26. The Flyers got off to a fast start, as Ivan Provorov scored in the game's opening minute. Philadelphia led 2-1 by the end of the first period as Farabee notched a shorthanded goal. After Sebastian Aho's second goal of the game knotted the score at 2-2 on the opening shift of the second period, Rasmus Ristolainen answered right back to restore a Flyers' lead. On the very next shift, Carolina's Jesper Fast made it 3-3. It was all Hurricanes thereafter, as Carolina scored two more unanswered goals to take a 5-3 edge into the third period. Andrei Svechnikov added insult to injury in the third period as Carolina won, 6-3, and outshot the Flyers by a final margin of 36-23.
The Flyers enter Monday's game looking to end a four-game winless streak. The last two games have been heartbreakers. In Pittsburgh on Feb. 15, the Flyers held a 4-2 lead midway through the third period only to lose in overtime, 5-4. Last Thursday at the Wells Fargo Center, two goals by Gerry Mayhew spurred the Flyers to a 3-2 lead. However, the Capitals scored three times in the final three minutes of the third period as the Flyers went down to a 5-3 defeat.
Here are five things to watch in this game:
1. Ristolainen and Brown Return
Defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen has missed the last three games with an upper-body injury suffered on Feb. 9 against the Detroit Red Wings. He will return to the Flyers' lineup for Monday's match, paired with usual blueline partner Travis Sanheim.
Ristolainen has averaged 21:05 of ice time per game this season. He leads the Flyers with 146 credited hits and is third in blocked shots with 71 (Ivan Provorov leads with 99 blocks, while Justin Braun has blocked 93 opposition shot attempts).
In addition to Ristolainen, the Flyers expect to have fourth-line center Patrick Brown back in the lineup for the first time since suffering a knee injury on Jan. 8 against the San Jose Sharks. Since being claimed off waivers from the Vegas Golden Knights just before the start of the regular season, Brown has appeared in 20 games (one goal, three assists, 11:57 TOI, 37 credited hits, 57.59 percent on faceoffs) while being a penalty killing mainstay.
Prior to the knee injury, Brown missed time this season due a bout with COVID-19 right after being claimed from Vegas. He later dealt with a fractured thumb. Brown's most effective stretch of play coincided with the Flyers' seven-game point streak that followed a 10-game winless streak.
The Flyers projected lineup on Monday (subject to change) is as follows:
23 Oskar Lindblom - 28 Claude Giroux - 89 Cam Atkinson
25 James van Riemsdyk - 21 Scott Laughton - 11 Travis Konecny
71 Max Willman - 48 Morgan Frost - 20 Gerry Mayhew
76 Isaac Ratcliffe - 39 Patrick Brown - 17 Zack MacEwen
9 Ivan Provorov - 61 Justin Braun
6 Travis Sanheim - 70 Rasmus Ristolainen
3 Keith Yandle - 24 Nick Seeler
79 Carter Hart
[35 Martin Jones]
PP1: Giroux, van Riemsdyk, Atkinson, Konecny, Provorov
PP2: Laughton, Mayhew, Lindblom, Ratcliffe, Yandle
2. Frost Watch
In Thursday's game against Washington, Morgan Frost logged just 9:10 of ice time. He only appeared in one of the Flyers' four power plays during the game. Frost was having a better game against the Capitals than he did in Pittsburgh until he lost a late third period 50-50 board battle to Carl Hagelin that eventually ended up in a game-tying deflection goal by Washington's Garnet Hathaway.
Yeo has taken a tough-love coaching approach with Frost since taking over as interim head coach. The coach praised the player for a run of five straight, high-energy, highly involved in the play games leading into the NHL All-Star break. Yeo said that he felt Frost's considerable offensive skill set would emerge at the NHL level with more consistency if he kept playing the way he did leading into the break.
However, Yeo has also not been shy about publicly calling out the rookie center for games in which the head coach feels Frost's energy has dipped and/or is insufficiently involved in battling for pucks and getting puck touches. Without mentioning the player by name, Yeo was critical of Frost's performance in the recent overtime loss against Pittsburgh.
In last Thursday's game, Frost held his own apart from the lost puck battle in the late stages of the third period. In his lone power play shift (26 seconds), Frost started the puck rotation that resulted in Mayhew's first of two goals in the game.
3. Inside the Numbers
The Hurricanes play a high-speed brand of hockey and typically enjoy a puck possession advantage. Entering this game, Carolina ranks third in shot attempt differentials at 5-on-5 (54.55 percent team Corsi) and sixth in all-situation expected goals share (53.80 percent).
The bottom line: The Flyers' opponent not only ranks 6th in goals per game (3.49), the Hurricanes also boast the NHL's second-best goals against average (2.41); a full goal against per game better than the 25th-ranked Flyers (3.43).

Oddly enough, in both meetings this season between the Flyers and Hurricanes, the team that scored first ended up losing in regulation. Overall, however, the Flyers are 12-3-6 when scoring first and 3-22-3 when trailing first. The Canes are 25-3-3 when scoring first and 9-8-1 when trailing first. The Hurricanes are 23-1-1 when leading after two periods, with the lone regulation loss coming against the Flyers on Nov. 12.

4. Behind Enemy Lines: Carolina Hurricanes
The Metro Division leading Hurricanes are 3-1-1 in their last five games and 6-2-2 over the last 10 games. Brind'Amour team is very dangerous in turning opposing turnovers into goals and they also excel at generating speed through the neutral zone, chipping the puck into the opposing zone and recovering the puck quickly on the other side.
On Sunday, the Hurricanes skated to a 4-3 road win over the Pittsburgh Penguins, moving two points (plus a 30-25 regulation win tiebreaker edge) ahead atop the Metropolitan Division standings.
Antti Raanta made 31 saves in his first start since Jan. 29. Jesperi Kotkaniemi (11th goal of the season) and Jordan Staal (4th) built a 2-0 lead only for Bryan Rust and Sidney Crosby to knot the score by the second intermission. In the third period, goals by Fast (10th) and Aho (power play, 22nd) restored a two-tally edge for the Hurricanes. A late power play goal by Evan Rodrigues narrowed the gap to 4-3 but the Canes closed the door thereafter.
The Hurricanes boast 10 different players who have posted at least 20 points so far this season (by comparison, the Flyers have five). Aho leads the club with 52 points and shares the goal lead with Svechnikov (22g, 25a, 47 points). Tony DeAngelo (9g, 31a, 40 points, +18) paces the blueline corps.
With Raanta having gotten the start in Pittsburgh, the Flyers are likely to face veteran goalie Frederik Andersen. In 35 outings this season, Andersen has posted a 26-7-2 record, 2.10 GAA, .927 save percentage, and two shutouts.
An aggressive puck-handling goalie, Andersen has often aided his team in quickly getting the puck to a teammate to trigger the breakout. As a bonus, he has posted four assists this season.
With the exception of Andersen returning to the net, the Hurricanes may go with the same lineup they iced against the Penguins:
37 Andrei Svechnikov - 20 Sebastian Aho - 86 Teuvo Teräväinen
78 Steven Lorentz - 16 Vincent Trocheck - 88 Martin Necas
21 Nino Niederreiter - 11 Jordan Staal - 71 Jesper Fast
48 Jordan Martinook - 82 Jesperi Kotkaniemi - 24 Seth Jarvis
74 Jaccob Slavin - 77 Tony DeAngelo
76 Brady Skjei - 22 Brett Pesce
28 Ian Cole - 25 Ethan Bear
31 Frederik Andersen
[32 Antti Raanta]
5. Players to Watch: Atkinson and Teräväinen
Cam Atkinson leads the Flyers with 17 goals (including three shorthanded tallies and a pair of power play goals). With 37 points in 49 games, Atkinson in one point behind Claude Giroux for the team lead. However, Atkinson has not scored a goal yet in February and his two-goal outburst against the LA Kings on Jan. 29 was the only game in the last 13 in which Atkinson found the net. He has posted seven assists in that span.
Teuvo Teräväinen brings a five-game point streak (1g, 6a) into Monday afternoon's game. The veteran Finnish forward has posted at least one point in nine of his last 10 games. In 21 career games against the Flyers, Teräväinen has posted 19 points (6g, 13a).