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Last year, the Philadelphia Flyers came up with an idea to address their long-suffering power play. Before the season, the team formed a power play committee to come up with suggestions on how to improve on the man advantage after several years of finishing at or near the bottom of the NHL’s power play efficiency rankings.
Former power play coach Rocky Thompson (who is now the head coach of the AHL’s Bridgeport Islanders) oversaw the committee. The committee was made up of Hockey Operations staff who extensively played on the power play during their NHL careers, such as general manager Daniel Briere, and the likes of John LeClair, Patrick Sharp and Dany Heatley.
Flyers power play: strong start then fell apart
Things worked out great earlier in the 2024-25 season. Through October 26 (the season’s first eight games), the Flyers power play went 8-for-31 for a 25.9 percent success rate. No one expected the team to sustain that level all year, but perhaps the team had finally turned the corner.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be. The power play went into a nosedive shortly thereafter and never recovered except for a couple of strong weeks in January. The Flyers finished at 15.0 percent on the season (30th in the NHL). Take away the first eight games of the season and it was 13.1 percent.
No, it wasn’t dead last again like it’d been in each of the previous years. But in a league where 22.5 percent was the leaguewide median and 21 of the 32 teams finished at 20 percent or better, 15 percent hardly felt like much progress from the team’s 12.2 percent mark (last leaguewide) in 2023-24. However, I guess “progress” is a relative term.
What went wrong?
There was absolutely nothing wrong with the committee idea itself. These were all really smart hockey guys who had tons of experience and personal success to draw upon. So why did things go south and never get back on track, other than the obvious need to bring more offensive talent onto the roster.
- The committee didn’t stay together. The group met before the season, but everyone else had other jobs to do once the season started.
- The power play under Rocky had a tendency to abandon strategies that clicked for a little while and then stopped working once opponents adjusted. For example, early on, the Flyers rotated Matvei Michkov and another forward (usually Morgan Frost) from the right half wall to the just below the goal line. The arrangement worked for a bit then went cold. Rather than coming back to it after a little while, it was no longer used for most of the season. I thought it was worth a try to mix that look back in from time to time. Likewise, there was a bit of success with a layered double netfront presence. It stopped working then it went away.
- I personally felt — and still do — that penalty killers’ input should be part of the brain storming for the team’s power play. As a PKer, what gives you trouble? What gives the goalie trouble? I killed penalties my entire NHL career. For me, unpredictable power plays and lots of traffic swirling around and disrupting the box/triangle caused issues.
- Passing up good looks and too many missed nets. Power play shots don’t need to be scorchers. They do need to get on the net. The Flyers missed the net far too often, whether it was from the circles, the slot or especially from the point. Opponents never had to respect any threat from the point, and would virtually dare the Flyers’ power play to get the puck on net with traffic at the net.
- Overreliance on back-door plays. The Flyers scored on their fair share of back-door plays last season, whether it was at 5-on-5 or the power play. However, the team overrelied on it, and too often forced bad passes.
Nice breakdown. The moral here seems to be you need a big bag of tricks to make a power play work and you should never throw tricks out completely after they get a bit cold.
The PP seemed to be static. A bunch of players not moving to get open while the guy with the puck either held on too long or tried to force a pass.
They had Michkov on the wrong side of the ice most of the time. He should have been on the right circle/half wall where he could utilize his one timer or have a better view of the play in front of him. Having him on the left side forced him to turn to shoot or have to be on his backhand to get the puck on net. The same goes for having Konecny on the right side, when he should have been on the left for the same reasons.
They passed up too many open shots and thus getting the puck to the net. As you said Bundy, they needed to get the puck to the paint where deflections/rebounds/hit skates/ and general mayhem could occur.
Like the rest of the Flyers fans I’ve been watching their ineffective power play for several years. Since nothing has worked for a while I propose that they simply play their top two regular lines and top two defensive pairs during the powerplay. The results can’t be any worse than what they currently are doing.