Game 48 Preview: Flyers vs. Lightning
The Philadelphia Flyers (25-16-6) will host the Tampa Bay Lightning (24-18-5) on Tuesday evening at the Wells Fargo Center. Game time is 7:00 p.m. ET.
The Flyers enter this game looking to avoid a three-game losing streak and salvage a split of their four-game homestand. On Sunday, the Flyers got outplayed and were unable to protect leads of 2-0 and 3-1 in an eventual 5-3 loss to the Ottawa Senators.
The Lightning are playing the third and final game of a four-game road trip. Tampa earned a 3-1 victory in Buffalo. On Sunday in Detroit, the Bolts lost to the Red Wings by a 2-1 score.
Samuel Ersson will get the start in goal against Tampa. In relief of Carter Hart (10 saves on 15 shots) in the third period of Saturday's game against Colorado, Ersson stopped eight of nine shots. Unfortunately, the one he allowed was a Colorado power play goal that leaked through his pads and was tapped in by Mikko Rantanen after the Flyers had shaved a three-goal deficit down to a single goal. On Sunday, Ersson stopped 29 of 33 shots in a losing cause against Ottawa.
On Monday, the Flyers assigned rookie right winger Bobby Brink to the AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms. He'd been scratched in four of the previous six games, including Sunday's game against Ottawa with Owen Tippett (day-to-day, lower body injury) unavailable. Even in several recent games where he did dress, Brink saw sparing ice time in a fourth-line or mix-and-match deployment pattern.
To fill the roster space vacated by Brink's loan to the Phantoms, the Flyers recalled winger Olle Lycksell. Lycksell had a previous recall in early December but only dressed in one game. He received eight shifts (6:11 TOI) in the Flyers' 4-1 win in Arizona on Dec. 7. He was loaned back to the Phantoms on Dec. 19. Flyers head coach John Tortorella said during his Tuesday morning media availability that Lycksell would be in the lineup against Tampa.
During the morning skate, Lycksell was on left wing of an undersized but skilled line with Morgan Frost and Cam Atkinson. It was not certain whether the Flyers would continue their usage of 11 forwards and seven defenseman.
However, given that Egor Zamula is coming off a three-point game (2g, 1a) against Ottawa and the power play has connected at least once in seven of the last nine games, the pattern of starting seven D with Zamula playing on the power play and mixed into some third pairing shifts seems likely to continue.
If so, Nic Deslauriers -- eight shifts, 5:10 TOI, 0 percent on-ice Corsi (0 SAF, 10 SAA) on Sunday against Ottawa -- will return to the scratch list on Tuesday. Veteran defenseman Marc Staal, as the eighth defenseman will likely remain a DND in this game.
It's believed that Tippett may be able to play later this week, per a source in Flyers hockey ops. However, he will likely miss his second game of the homestand. Tippett was not on the ice for the morning skate.
Tampa is a team that still has a lot of firepower -- and the NHL's top-ranked power play -- but they've struggled most of the season to keep the puck out of their net at 5-on-5. In their last game, the Lightning had a tough time working through tight checking by the Detroit Red Wings and lost, 2-1. However, Jon Cooper's club has won seven of its last 10 games.
Projected lineups are below. Keep in mind that he Flyers have often been rotating wingers around the line combinations over the course of many games in recent weeks, and players such as Travis Konecny, Joel Farabee and Tyson Foerster often see shifts on various different combos at 5-on-5 with TK and center Sean Couturier typically pulling 20-plus minutes of ice time on most nights.
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FLYERS (morning skate, subject to change)
86 Joel Farabee - 14 Sean Couturier - 11 Travis Konecny
62 Olle Lycksell - 48 Morgan Frost - 89 Cam Atkinson
71 Tyson Foerster - 21 Scott Laughton - 19 Garnet Hathaway
27 Noah Cates - 25 Ryan Poehling - (rotation)
6 Travis Sanheim - 9 Jamie Drysdale
24 Nick Seeler - 26 Sean Walker
8 Cam York - 55 Rasmus Ristolainen
5 Egor Zamula
33 Samuel Ersson
[79 Carter Hart]
Projected scratches: 44 Nicolas Deslauriers (healthy), 18 Marc Staal (healthy), 74 Owen Tippett (lower body injury).
Lightning (Sunday's lineup, subject to change)
20 Nick Paul - 21 Brayden Point - 86 Nikita Kucherov
38 Brandon Hagel - 71 Anthony Cirelli - 91 Steven Stamkos
23 Michael Eyssimont - 64 Tyler Motte - 73 Conor Sheary
51 Austin Watson - 64 Luke Glendening - 39 Waltteri Merelä
77 Victor Hedman - 48 Nicklaus Perbix
43 Calvin de Haan - 43 Darren Raddysh
78 Emil Martinsen-Lilleberg - 65 Maxwell Crozier
88 Andrei Vasilevskiy
31 Jonas Johansson
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