Tonight the Flyers will take the ice for the final time before their 2016-17 regular season begins next week, as they’ll head to Boston to take on the team they edged out for the final playoff spot in the East last season.
It’s been an interesting preseason for the Flyers, who have seen two top prospects likely earn spots on their opening-night roster but have also been struck with several inopportune injuries — ones that have them staring at a complex roster and cap situation as the preseason comes to an end.
You would think that, with one contest left before the games actually start to matter, the Flyers’ primary goal tonight is to simply avoid getting anyone else injured. However, this game is the closest the Flyers will come to icing and facing off with an actual NHL roster in the preseason, as both they and Boston are rolling with lineups pretty similar to what they’ll have on the ice when the season begins.
Courtesy of the Inquirer’s Sam Carchidi, here are the lines expected for tonight’s game:
First line tonight: Raffl-G-Simm; second line: Konecny-Coots-Voracek. #Flyers
— Sam Carchidi (@BroadStBull) October 8, 2016
Third line: Cousins-Bellemare-Weise. Fourth: VV-Gordon-Read. #Flyers
— Sam Carchidi (@BroadStBull) October 8, 2016
Courtesy of our own Kyle Phillippi, these four lines are all lines that the team ran in practice yesterday. The three forwards still on the roster that will be out tonight are Brayden Schenn (who will miss the first three games of the year due to suspension), Roman Lyubimov (who seems likely to be sent to Lehigh Valley soon due to his waiver-exempt status), and Jordan Weal.
Also via Kyle, the expected defensive pairs are as follows:
Gudas – Schultz
Gostisbehere – MacDonald
Provorov – Streit
With Brandon Manning and Michael Del Zotto being injured, these are essentially the only six players the Flyers have available for now. Some things in the lineup may change next week, but for all intents and purposes, we’re probably looking at the Flyers’ opening-night roster in action here.
And they’ll be going up against a Bruins lineup that will also contain most of their opening-day roster:
Full varsity vs. PHI. Expected lines:
Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak
Spooner-Krejci-Backes
Beleskey-Czarnik-Hayes
Heinen-Moore-Nash— Fluto Shinzawa (@GlobeFluto) October 8, 2016
Expected defense:
Chara-Carlo
Krug-O’Gara
Ehrhoff-K. Miller— Fluto Shinzawa (@GlobeFluto) October 8, 2016
Even if that Bruins defense is a bit of a mess, it should be interesting to see how guys still technically on the roster bubble perform against what is basically an NHL lineup.
Steve Mason (now complete with Dad Strength) and Tuukka Rask (who will not have Dad Strength at his disposal today) will be starting in net. The preseason finally ends tonight. Just don’t get hurt.
***
Philadelphia Flyers @ Boston Bruins:
Where: TD Garden, Boston, Mass.
When: 5:00 p.m. ET
How To Watch: NHL Network (will apparently be joining the game in progress around 5:30?)
How to Listen: 97.5 The Fanatic
