The Philadelphia Flyers (33-24-8) will host David Quinn's San Jose Sharks (16-40-7) at Wells Fargo Center on Tuesday evening. Game time is 7:00 p.m. EDT.
The game will be televised on NBCSP. The radio broadcast is on 93.3 WMMR with an online simulcast on Flyers Radio 24/7.
This is the second and final meeting of the season series between the teams, and the lone game in Philadelphia. Back on November 7 in San Jose, the Sharks defeated the Flyers, 2-1.
The Flyers enter this game coming off a split of a Florida road trip, defeating the Florida Panthers, 2-1, last Thursday and then losing to the Tampa Bay Lightning, 7-0, on Saturday. Overall. Philly is 4-5-1 over its last 10 games.
In Saturday's game in Tampa, Flyers head coach John Tortorella received a game misconduct for arguing a couple of first-period penalties. Initially refusing to leave the bench area, Tortorella was subsequently suspended two games by the National Hockey League. Associate coach Brad Shaw and assistant coach Rocky Thompson (in charge of the forwards) will run the bench against San Jose on Tuesday and the Toronto Maple Leafs on Thursday.
The Sharks, 1-7-2 over their last 10 games and 6-21-4 on the road this season, are starting a five-game road trip. During their recent homestand, the Sharks gave the Dallas Stars a battle in a 7-6 overtime, before getting blown out by a 7-2 score against the New York Islanders and then falling to the Ottawa Senators, 2-1.
Here are five things to watch in Tuesday's game.
1. Working Around Battered Blueline
To put it bluntly, the Flyers defense corps is something of a MASH unit right now. Nick Seeler (lower-body), Jamie Drysdale (upper-body) and Rasmus Ristolainen (upper-body) are on Injured Reserve and considered week-to-week.
Egor Zamula has been dealing with an illness since the weekend. The Flyers, who were only able to dress five defensemen in Saturday's game in Tampa, recalled defenseman Adam Ginning from the AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms on an emergency basis on Monday.
Travis Sanheim (11 points in his last 13 games) briefly left Saturday's game with an apparent lower-body issue, and took a maintenance day on Monday. He's expected to be OK to play against the Sharks. Likewise, Cam York has been dealing with an upper-body issue for a few weeks. He has taken a couple of maintenance days or (on one occasion) donned a no-contact jersey at practice, but he's able to play in the games.
The Flyers acquired veteran defenseman Erik Johnson at the trade deadline last Friday in order to add a much-needed healthy right defenseman following the injuries to Drysdale and Ristolainen and the trade last Wednesday that sent Sean Walker to the Colorado Avalanche. Additionally, recent recall Ronnie Attard, played in both the Florida and Tampa games. Attard is another right-handed shooting defenseman.
When the Flyers traded Walker for a 2025 first-round pick, they knew they'd face adjustments in triggering breakouts from the defensive zone and attacking with speed; things Walker did exceptionally well during his three-quarters of a season with the team. The adjustments are an early work in progress.
2. Flyers Need Scorers to Step Up
Since the All-Star break, the Flyers most consistent forward line has been the trio of Ryan Poehling (8g, 13a, 21 points), Noah Cates (3g, 10a, 13 points in 43 games) and Garnet Hathaway (7g, 4a, 11 points. 106 penalty minutes). That line has consistently outworked opponents of late, and even chipped in some timely offense.
Meanwhile, Scott Laughton has been the Flyers' hottest forward from an offensive standpoint over the last month. He recently dealt with an illness, although he remained in the lineup. Over the Flyers last 13 games, Laughton has produced 12 points (5g, 7a). Laughton has two points (1g, 1a) over the last five games and 32 points (10g. 22a) overall for the season.
Rookie winger Tyson Foerster has seven points (6g, 1a) in his last nine games and 28 points (16g, 12a) in 60 games played overall. However, he's been held without a point in four of the team's last five games -- the exception being a two-goal performance against Ottawa on March 2 .
With leading scorer Travis Konecny (27g, 27a in 59 games) back in the lineup since last Thursday, the Flyers could use a breakout game offensively. Likewise, Philly needs more production than they've gotten over the last 13 games from any of Sean Couturier (1g, 3a), Joel Farabee (1g, 3a), Owen Tippett (4g, 3a) or Morgan Frost (1g, 6a).
Bobby Brink scored goals in back-to-back games since his recent recall but was moved to the bottom of the lineup or scratched of late. The Flyers acquired Denis Gurianov at the trade deadline and hope he can recover the offensive form that the former first-round pick showed as a rookie with Dallas in 2019-20.
3. Philly Power Play Needs a Spark
From early January through the Stadium Series game, the Flyers power play showed signs of improvement (connecting on 20.7 percent of their power plays in 18 games between January 6 and February 17). Despite still being ranked for the season near the bottom of the NHL power play rankings, things seemed to be trending the right way.
Unfortunately, since then, the Flyers are once again stuck in a rut on the man advantage. The Flyers enter Tuesday's game having scored on just five of their last 47 power plays (10.6 percent) since the Stadium Series.
The Flyers have slipped back to the dreaded 32nd ranking on the power play for the 2023-24 season: 12.7 percent (26-for-205). The Sharks enter Tuesday's game ranked 31st on the penalty kill at 73.5 percent (opposing power play are 54-for-204).
4. Flyers PK Needs a Bounceback from One-Game Hiccup
The Flyers entered Saturday's game ranked No. 1 on the penalty kill across the entire NHL. Going in, however, the Flyers knew they could ill-afford to take penalties against Tampa's top-ranked power play. Philly ended up yielding three power play goals for just the second time this season (the first was on Oct. 14 in Ottawa),
Consequently, the Flyers check in for Tuesday's game ranked second in the NHL on the penalty kill at a still-impressive 85.4 percent. The Flyers lead the NHL with 14 shorthanded goals scored.
The Sharks have massively struggled at 5-on-5 either to score or to keep the puck out of their net. However, San Jose is actually a respective power play club overall this season at 20.7 percent (32-for-155). On the negative side, the club has yielded seven shorthanded goals in 2023-24, putting San Jose in the bottom one-third in that regard.
5. Behind Enemy Lines: San Jose Sharks
The Flyers already learned the hard way this season -- when they became the victims of San Jose's first win of the 2023-24 season -- that they cannot expect the Sharks to meekly roll over and accept a thrashing. The Flyers will still have to go out and earn a win against the Sharks, regardless of the opponent's record.
Veteran Mikael Granlund leads the Sharks with 31 assists and 40 points this season. Fabian Zetterlund tops the team with 16 goals across all manpower situations, while 21-year-old William Eklund paces the team with five power play tallies among his 10 goals and 30 points overall.
The Sharks have a pair of former New Jersey Devils goalies on their roster. At the trade deadline, Vitek Vanecek joined the Sharks to go along with Mackenzie Blackwood. The Sharks acquired Vanecek from the Devils in exchange for goalie Kaapo Kahkonen.
