The Philadelphia Flyers are just hours away from hosting their first second-round playoff game since 2012 and we have good what looks to be a brand-new lineup for Game 3 against the Carolina Hurricanes.
With Noah Cates suffering a series-ending injury, head coach Rick Tocchet was forced to make some major changes to his lineup. The 27-year-old center was a key part of what worked down the middle and since this team is already lacking some firepower at center — especially considering Cates and his four points in the playoffs was among the leading scorers for Flyers centermen — now they need to look elsewhere to try and get the first win of the series on Thursday night.
At morning skate, with so many players taking the optional day off to get as much rest and recovery time in as possible before puck drop, it was hard to determine what the lines are going to look like. But with a mix of what reports saw Thursday morning and knowing who Tocchet likes to pair together, NBC Sports Philadelphia’s Jordan Hall came up with a estimated projection that looks perfectly reasonable to us:
Tyson Foerster — Christian Dvorak — Travis Konecny
Alex Bump — Trevor Zegras — Porter Martone
Carl Grundstrom — Denver Barkey — Matvei Michkov
Luke Glendening — Sean Couturier — Garnet Hathaway
Travis Sanheim — Rasmus Ristolainen
Cam York — Jamie Drysdale
Nick Seeler — Emil Andrae
The blue line is the easiest projection of them all, since if Noah Juulsen is for sure not coming in, it’s going to be Emil Andrae on that bottom pair as that is the only rotation Tocchet has done for the majority of this season when all defenseman are healthy.
But up top, considering that Trevor Zegras and Sean Couturier are the two forwards who did take the option, this looks like a fairly reasonable projection for what we will see tonight on the ice.
Flyers going with new-look lineup featuring new combinations
Up top, Christian Dvorak is a little bit banged up but is expected to play in Game 3, and next to him are two wingers who are struggling a bit to get on the score sheet. It’s not the best line ever put together, but it could be a line that gets some stuff going if those specific players can be given certain offensive opportunities. They probably won’t finish the game with the most amount of minutes, but should generate at least something with Foerster’s solid defensive play this series and Konecny has been moving the puck well.
The “second line” is surely the most interesting. Your eyes fixate on that Zegras-Martone potential combination and think of the 19-year-old rookie getting his offensive juices flowing once more since he’s gone cold, having not scored a point since Game 3 against the Penguins. We have seen this combination before, in the series-winning Game 6 last week, as this duo played with Owen Tippett — and kind of got cratered having been out-attempted 17-5 at 5-on-5. But hopefully adding Alex Bump maybe changes a bit of that fortune and they don’t get on their heels a whole lot.
Denver Barkey is going to remain at center, since it is the easiest option to make with Cates out for the series if Tocchet does not want to move up Sean Couturier from the fourth line. And with that, Carl Grundstrom will be getting a good opportunity as he’s going to be on the opposite flank of Matvei Michkov. It will be incredibly interesting to see how this line gels and how much of the work they put in to get their scoring chances, but Barkey has certainly not looked too out of place down the middle.
And finally, our trusted fourth line is here and is going to try to punish every single Hurricane on the ice tonight.
If this happens, it will be interesting to see how Tocchet uses Couturier. There is an overwhelming argument to be made that he has been the Flyers’ best player in the playoffs and he should get a chance to play with more offensively gifted players. Wouldn’t it have made more sense to put Barkey back on wing and have him next to Couturier and Michkov as a balanced third line? And then put Luke Glendening at center? Maybe, but it’s also not our call of course and this is just what we’re going to see on the lineup sheet.
Regardless, the Flyers have been forced to get creative without Cates being able to solidify the middle of the lineup and continue to play with Michkov. Now, the 21-year-old winger is getting a new center and is going to try to put some much-needed points on the board at the same time.
We’ll see how all of this works out, but no matter what, the Flyers need someone to come up big and be the hero and with these new combinations, it will provide an interesting opportunity for something to arise.
