Rick Tocchet's Philadelphia Flyers (24-18-9) are in Ohio on Wednesday to take on Rick Bowness's Columbus Blue Jacket (24-20-7). This is the first of three meetings between the Metropolitan Division teams this season.
Game time at Nationwide Arena is 7:30 p.m. EST. The game will be broadcast nationally on TNT.
Coming off a 2-0-1 western road trip, the Flyers had a flat performance in a 4-0 home loss to the New York Islanders on Monday. The Flyers are 2-6-2 over their last 10 games.
The Blue Jackets, who are 6-4-0 in their last 10 games, have won back-to-back games. Coming off a 1-0 road win against the Dallas Stars, the Blue Jackets cooled off the surging Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday night. Monday's scheduled home game against the Los Angeles Kings was postponed due to the winter storms affecting much of the country. The game will be made up on March 9.
Here are the RAV4 Things to watch in Wednesday's game.
1. Between the pipes
Barring a setback at the morning skate, Dan Vladar (16-7-4, 2.46 GAA, .905 save percentage) may be able to dress for the first time since leaving the January 14 game against the Buffalo Sabres. Samuel Ersson (8-9-5, 3.39 GAA, .860 SV%) has started each of the last four games and made appearances in each of the last eight games.
Aleksei Kolosov (0-2-0, 4.00 GAA, .830 SV%) remained with the team through Tuesday's practice at the Flyers Training Center in Voorhees.
Jet Greaves (16-12-6, 2.68 GAA, .908 SV%) has emerged as a reliable starting goaltender for Columbus. He's backed up by Elvis Merzlikins (8-8-1, 3.81 GAA, .882 SV%).
2. Pucks and traffic to the net
The Flyers largely lacked meaningful scoring chances against the Islanders after the first period of Monday's game. For a stretch of 30-plus minutes from the start of the second period until midway through the third period, the Flyers generated just one high-danger scoring chance.
How did the Flyers produce seven goals against an elite team like Colorado after getting four in Utah? They attacked the middle, and got players below and between the dots. They needed to get back to that in Columbus.
3. Bounceback game for Dvorak
Christian Dvorak has had a strong all-around season in his first campaign with the Flyers including 32 points (12g, 20a) in 50 games played. However, Dvorak has been pressing of late along with much of the team.
In the Flyers' win against Colorado, Dvorak was uncharacteristically charged with six giveaways. He was also forcing play in the Islanders' game, looking for offense, and wound up minus-three for the night.
Although Dvorak can score occasionally, his game is based on responsible two-way play. Most of his offensive output is either via opportunistic chances or distributing the puck.
4. Special teams
The Flyers lost the special teams battle against the Islanders after having a very promising first power play of the game. Philly ended up minus-two on special teams, giving up a shorthanded goal and a New York power play tally. Both ends of special teams had started to stabilize during the recent three-game road trip. The Flyers can ill-afford to backslide into the issues that plagued the club during its six-game winless skid that preceded the wins in Vegas and Colorado.
