It is hard to describe what has happen to the Flyers over the past two weeks. On March 24th the Flyers had an 88% chance of making the playoffs. Since then they have lost eight games in a row, six of which were against teams outside of a playoff position. Over this stretch they have been outscored 42 to 18 and have fallen to only a 6% chance of making the playoffs. The new goalie combination of Ersson and Fedotov have also struggled over this period. But the main problem has been the shaky defense and ice cold offense.
The Flyers were playing without half of their defensive starters before this drought. But the additions of Seeler and Drysdale have not helped the team like it should have as Ristolainen will most likely miss the rest of the season. While the forwards were without Captain Sean Couturier for two games with a shoulder injury.
Since nothing has worked over the past two weeks Coach Tortorella has been forced to throw together different lineups every night hoping that something would click. For some nights it looked like the Flyers were fielding an AHL roster with players like Ginning, Attard, and Staal, playing over Couturier, Atkinson, and Deslauriers. Ginning and Attard ending up being the only goal scorers for the Flyers on Saturday night in a 6-2 loss to Columbus. While Couturier, Atkinson, and Deslauriers have all been scratched multiple times this season due to lackluster performances while making up 18.4% of the team’s total cap space. While others like Konecny has not scored in six games and Farabee who snapped a ten game goalless drought during garbage time of a 9-3 blowout loss to the Canadians.
The Flyers have three games left in the regular season to try and salvage what was once an exciting season. They are in action Thursday night at the New York Rangers, Saturday hosting the Devils, and Tuesday night hosting the Capitals. The Flyers are two points out of the last Wild Card spot which is currently held by the Capital who have four games left in their season.
Graham Hughes / AP
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