Shoutout to Dave Hakstol: Flyers at Canadiens Preview
The (23-43-11) Philadelphia Flyers will enter Quebec tonight to take on the (23-43-11) Montreal Canadiens. Linus Hogberg is set to join the ongoing tire fire that is the Philadelphia Flyers and make his NHL debut in a historically iconic building. You can catch the game tonight at 7 pm on NBCSP.
These two teams are bad.
There’s zero way to sugarcoat this..both of these teams stink. Montreal and Arizona are the only two teams in the league right now that have a worse record than the Flyers. These two teams are so bad I’m genuinely scouring the TV in hopes to find anything else to put on.
This is the third and final matchup between these two teams (every NHL fan applauds), with the Canadiens taking both of the previous games in a shootout and OT.
You don’t have to do a lot of searching to see just how brutal these two franchises are right now, just look at both of their special team rankings. The Flyers PP is 32nd in the league and the Canadien’s PP is 31st.
The Flyer’s penalty kill is currently 27th in the NHL with the Canadiens again, right behind them with the 28th worst PK. The only thing the Flyers are significantly better at right now is faceoffs (6th in the league) to Montreal’s 20th.
Linus Hogberg
Kevin Connauton got hurt Tuesday night in Toronto (lower-body injury) and with the way Mike Yeo was talking after the game, don’t expect him back at all this season. In fact, we might’ve just watched Connauton’s final game in a Flyers sweater.
So, with all of that happening, the Flyers have called up Linus Hogberg (139th overall pick in 2016). Linus is currently slotted next to Travis Sanheim on the second pair. Hogberg can move the puck well in his own zone but is no offensive dynamo by any means. He currently has 0G-7A-7P in 57 games this season with the Phantoms and for his career as a pro, has 2G-13A-15p in 83 games.
Martin Jones
Jones will get the nod again tonight, allowing four goals against the Toronto Maple Leafs during their loss on Tuesday. Over the season he has allowed a GAA of 3.53 with a .897 SV%.
Shoutout to Dave Hakstol
Don’t get me wrong, as soon as this season officially ends I’ll be back to not liking Dave Hakstol, but as of right now…I’m his #1 fan.
The pointless Hak wins at the end of the season are now paying off for us Flyers fans as his Seattle Kraken were able to beat the Colorado Avalanche last night and jump ahead of the Flyers in the overall standings.
As of right now, the Flyers are the 3rd worst team in the league at 57 points and with last night’s effort from Hakstol’s Kraken, they legitimately have a shot at landing the 3rd overall pick in the 2022 NHL draft.
It’s officially that time to start talking about the draft since this is currently our “playoffs”. As of right now, here are my Top 5 for the draft.
- Shane Wright
- Logan Cooley
- Juraj Slafkovsky
- Simon Nemec
- Matthew Savoie
I could see Slafkovsky being on a ton of teams’ rankings as the #2 prospect, but Cooley is a C, so that gives him a little boost.
Flyers Lineup vs Montreal
Laughton – Hayes – Konecny
JVR – Farbaee – Brink
Cates – Frost – Tippett
Lindblom – Thompson – MacEwen
Provorov – Attard
Hogberg – Sanhiem
Yandle – Zamula
Jones
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Mandatory Credit: Zack Hill - Flyers PR - Flyers Twitter
