The Philadelphia Flyers (7-9-2) will look to end a four game losing streak tonight with a rematch against the Columbus Blue Jackets. Columbus (6-11-2) is the team that started the losing streak last Friday. Game time is 7:00 from the Wells Fargo Center.
The Flyers are coming off a tough loss on Thursday against Minnesota. After coming back from a 2-1 deficit in the third, a fluky bounce off the corner boards ended up behind Ray Emery with less than a minute to play handing Philadelphia a 3-2 regulation loss.
Claude Giroux and Mark Streit scored for the Flyers and Jakub Voracek earned yet another assist in the loss. It also marked one of the rare occasions recently in which the Flyers outshot their opponent. Emery was solid despite taking the loss.
Thursday night saw Scott Laughton make his 2014 home debut. Thursday also marked the return of defensemen Andrew MacDonald and Luke Schenn. The Flyers penalty kill was better over the last two games but still needs a lot of work.
In order to win tonight, Philadelphia must work harder than Columbus. Despite their record, the Jackets are one of the hardest working teams in the NHL. They will also need to do a better job at containing Nick Foligno and Ryan Johansen. Last Friday's game saw Johansen net four assists and Foligno added two goals.
Columbus is coming off a tought shootout loss at the hands of the Bruins on Friday. Playing on consecutive nights, the hard working Jackets need to worry about fatigue. Sergei Bobrovsky made 38 saves last night in the loss but looked sharp. His hand injury does not seem to be bothering him anymore.
Projected Flyers Lineup (Subject to change)
Potential Scratches – Michael Del Zotto, Michael Raffl- Chris VandeVelde
10 Brayden Schenn – 28 Claude Giroux – 93 Jakub Voracek
24 Matt Read – 14 Sean Couturier – 17 Wayne Simmonds
18 R.J. Umberger – 49 Scott Laughton – 40 Vincent Lecavalier
36 Zac Rinaldo – 78 Pierre-Edouard Bellemare – 42 Jason Akeson
5 Braydon Coburn – 55 Nick Schultz
8 Nicklas Grossmann – 32 Mark Streit
47 Andrew MacDonald – 22 Luke Schenn
35 Steve Mason
Watch – CSNPhilly
Listen – 97.5 The FANatic
Bill Minchin is a contributing writer for Flyerdelphia. Follow Bill on Twitter @wtfd103074
