January 20, 2026
The Flyers finally caught themselves.
Travis Konecny picked two pucks at their own blue line, hustled down the rink to score both of them on breakaways, then they had to hang on for dear life for 12 minutes and change Monday night in Vegas.
But they survived it. They withstood the Golden Knights with a 2-1 win to snap a six-game losing streak and give themselves a break, if just for a second.
But they have a considerable hole to climb out of now.
That losing skid sent them sliding to the outside of the playoff bubble in the East, amid a two-week stretch where if they could've just walked out of it playing even .500 hockey, they would've not only had still been holding on to a divisional or Wild Card spot, but probably would've generated some decent separation for themselves in the postseason picture.
Instead, they went 0-5-1 for just one point against opponents all in the East playoff race with them before finally snapping out of it against Vegas, getting woefully outscored 31-12 in the process.
They got banged up – Jamie Drysdale and Bobby Brink were both down, while Dan Vladar, Rasmus Ristolainen, and Rodrigo Ābols are currently down with injuries – got away from themselves and the style of game that had gotten them by before, couldn't get a save, couldn't keep up, and now in the standings, they're looking up.
They're 23-17-8 for 54 points after Monday night, sitting three points out from the second Wild Card spot held by Buffalo and third place in the Metropolitan Division, which is occupied by Pittsburgh, with both clubs sitting at 57 points.
And look, it was just a bad run marred by some really bad hockey from the Flyers. There's really no sugarcoating it, especially after they got trounced by the Rangers 6-3 at home on Saturday, with the odd-man rushes and post-to-post passes getting surrendered in bunches.
They needed that win Monday night in Vegas, but now, at only the first leg of a three-game road trip out West, and with the Olympic break looming, the Flyers have to climb...
Climb, and not look down.
"Just put the rest of those games behind us that we struggled in, and get back to believing in who we are," Konecny said postgame in Vegas. "We gotta be tight, we gotta be detailed, and we gotta play for one another. We're not gonna be able to do everything as a one-man show. It's gotta be a team effort for our squad.
"I just believe in that, and whatever the outside noise is, we don't care. Just keep believing in ourselves."
It's just going to be a climb now.
A few more thoughts on the Flyers...
The Philadelphia Flyers, for 40 years running, have a goalie problem.
While they don't believe Vladar's recent injury was too serious, he was placed on Injured Reserve on Monday retroactive to January 14, when the leading goaltender appeared to suffer it in the 5-2 loss to Buffalo.
Sam Ersson and then Aleksei Kolosov in a call-up behind him, though, have been brutal.
Ersson got shelled for seven goals in the first of two games against the Lightning last week, both got tagged for three each a few days later in Pittsburgh, and Saturday against the Rangers; Well, if you've never seen a goalie finish a game with a .000 save percentage, you just did.
Kolosov faced his first three shots, let in three goals, and was yanked for Ersson, but by then, he wasn't going to do much anything about the Rangers flying down the ice in numbers.
Credit Ersson for bouncing back in a big way against Vegas Monday night, holding the Knights to just a goal allowed with 24 saves that were all needed down to the last second.
But Ersson has an .860 save percentage and a 3.30 goals against average so far this season. Good outings from him this year have been an exception, not the rule.
As for Kolosov, he just turned 24, and with a small sample size right now, he still looks like he needs a lot of AHL minutes down with the Phantoms (keep in mind: goalies and defensemen take the longest to develop).
It's been tough for the Flyers to count on a save when Vladar isn't playing.
At the same time, however, they haven't exactly done their goalies many favors during the six-game slide.
Aleksei Kolosov did not make a save against the Rangers on Saturday.
They were leaving unmarked assignments, especially on the penalty kill, which gave way to passes stretching across the ice that force a goalie to slide post-to-post and split his decision-making between facing the direct shot or betting on a pass.
Additionally, they were getting caught on the offensive end of the ice with one too many skaters moving in low toward the net, which can quickly get flipped into an odd-man rush the other way as soon as the opposing team gets the puck.
Saturday's loss to the Rangers felt like the worst of those sins, with the knife getting twisted by a Rangers team that isn't even all that fast and just sent a letter out to its fans essentially waiving the white flag on their own season.
It's been brutal to watch, and was such a deviation from head coach Rick Tocchet's emphasis since the start of training camp that the Flyers need to play with a structure that takes half the ice away – i.e., forcing shots to be taken from only one side so the goalie has less to worry about.
Monday night's win over Vegas was a pretty marked improvement in getting back to that.
Travis Sanheim and the Flyers had to be better about pushing the Knights to the outside on Monday night.
The Flyers generally gave the Knights a tough time trying to get the puck to the inside, and definitely didn't let them pinball the puck all around the zone this time to draw anyone out of position. Philly tightened up defensively, maybe at the risk of their own output with just 17 shots on goal, but it kept a relatively high-shooting Knights team to just 25 and left the Flyers with a chance.
Vegas' only goal on Monday night was on a Tomas Hertl deflection between his legs that, honestly, you really couldn'tdo anything about, and then their most dangerous chance to tie it at the end was on a 6-on-4 with the seconds ticking down and the Knights' very best out there.
Mitch Marner, from the point, actually did clear a pass across the zone to Jack Eichel at the opposite circle, but it was a stretch that took so long to travel and had Eichel standing too far wide that Ersson had the feed read with more than enough time to slide over and swallow up the shot.
The Flyers still have a lot to clean up as they go in the next week, but they cleaned up just enough defensively against Vegas to make something work.
Bobby Rink returned to the lineup Monday night for the first time since taking a hard hit through open ice against Anaheim on Jan. 6, and he was an underrated part of the Flyers'win Monday night.
Brink skated 13:28 against Vegas, and brought some more aggressive checking and skating back into the fold, along with sound positioning.
Late into the third period, when the Knights were trying to rally back, Brink stepped in front of a puck and knocked it away by the Flyers' own blue line, which disrupted Vegas trying to set up in the offensive zone with the clock ticking. He also looked pretty strong along the wall in battles after the puck, despite regularly being undersized at 5'8", which is always one of those little things that pile up to bigger payoffs eventually.
The Flyers definitely missed his motor while they were in freefall, and it was a stretch where they clearly missed Tyson Foerster and everything he brought on Brink's opposite wing before he went down with injury, too.
They at least have Brink back, though, and while he's no star, his fundamentals can do a lot to have his line back houding whoever has the puck.
The Flyers' discipline had also been a key problem through their losing streak, and though they beat Vegas, they were still in the penalty box seven times on Monday night, including twice late while they were trying to fend the Knights off.
Stay out of the penalty box. It's bad. #Analysis.
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