Shayne Gostisbehere got a small taste of the NHL as an emergency call-up last season. He played in two games before going back to the AHL. Five games later, his season was over after an ACL injury.
The Flyers game in Carolina on Saturday night, Nov. 14, was a long time coming for Gostisbehere. It was on Nov. 7 the previous year that Gostisbehere suffered his season-ending injury.
The 22-year-old defenseman spent the rest of the season working to get back on the ice. As the recovery progressed, he worked out to get stronger. He watched several games from the press box of Wells Fargo Center.
Gostisbehere's journey back came complete on Saturday not only by taking the ice, but directly helping the Flyers rally for a win. His first NHL point was an assist on Wayne Simmonds game-tying goal.
In three NHL games total, Gostisbehere has not looked out of place and given the state of the Flyers defense, this was a move that was necessary. Ron Hextall seemed to know that.
The Flyers had lost steady defenseman Mark Streit to injury, opening up the cap space and roster spot for Gostisbehere. The team had lost eight of their last nine games.
One player isn't a fix, and a 22-year-old certainly isn't going to solve all of the team's problems. But the Flyers needed some aspect of excitement.
Look no further than game No. 1 with Gostisbehere. The rookie gets the assist on the game-tying goal with under four minutes to play after the Flyers had hovered around the net in the third. Moments later, in overtime, Jake Voracek snapped his long goalless drought with the game-winner.
With Streit's injury keeping him out for six weeks, Gostisbehere should have a spot in the lineup for quite a while. And perhaps, those six weeks will be enough for the audition to be over.
The future is slowly transitioning to the present. Patience is a key to all of it. But after a while, patience runs thin. Losing eight of nine will do that. Saturday's game took on a whole new excitement when Gostisbehere entered the lineup along with Taylor Leier.
Gostisbehere will get the experience of playing in front of the home crowd again, as he did in his first two NHL games, when he faces the Los Angeles Kings, one of the opponents he played against in 2014-15. And there will probably be an extra buzz in the crowd to see the Flyers defenseman.
After all, there will be a Ghost in the building. And who doesn't love a good Ghost story.
Kevin Durso is managing editor for Flyerdelphia. Follow him on Twitter @Kevin_Durso.
