September 03, 2015
After “The Summer of Ron,” Flyers hockey is right around the corner. Over the past couple of days, the team has announced their preseason plans for the 2015-16 season.
Unlike in past years, they won’t be making any trips to practice outside of Voorhees. General manager Ron Hextall said this was a conscious decision after the team got off to slow starts the past couple of years. From the Courier-Post’s Dave Isaac:
“We felt like we needed to change something,” Hextall said. “We did (go away) last season and the year before. We’re gonna be local here and it’s a mentality, though. The preseason matters. You want guys to play hard every game and try to win every game. It’s a habit. There’s gonna be a little more emphasis on it. I’m not saying we didn’t put emphasis on it; we did. But we need to really stamp the fact that we need to get off to a good start.”
Things get underway with rookie camp on Monday, September 14th, which probably didn’t mean quite as much in past years. Now with a revamped system of prospects, one that ESPN Insider’s Corey Pronman vaulted all the way up to 10th in the NHL from 25th the year before, there are going to be more than a few highly regarded young players at the Skate Zone.
All of the oft-discussed defensemen will be present and accounted for: Ivan Provorov, Travis Sanheim, Shayne Gostisbehere, Samuel Morin, and Robert Hagg. Joining them in the forward pool will be 2015 first-round pick Travis Konecny and the grizzled veteran of the group, 21-year-old Scott Laughton.
Twenty-four players are scheduled to suit up for the three-day rookie camp. Practices, which run from the 14th to 16th, will consist of on-ice sessions beginning at 9:45 AM that are free and open to the public.
A couple of days later, the big guns will join the prospects as a total of 63 players are projected to kick off training camp on Friday, September 18th. Over a three-day span that weekend, the players will be on the ice for sessions at 9:45 AM and 1:00 PM, respectively. Again, those are free and open to the public.
Then, they’ll start working games in on Monday, September 21st with a couple of split-squad (that term works for hockey, no?) matchups with the New York Islanders in Allentown and Brooklyn. The next night, the Flyers will host the New York Rangers at Wells Fargo Center aka “The Center.”
Follow Rich on Twitter: @rich_hofmann
