The Philadelphia Flyers, dressing a lineup of role players, roster bubble guys and a large contingent of Lehigh Valley Phantoms players and with assistant coach Darryl Williams behind the bench (John Tortorella delegated running the bench to assistants in six of the seven exhibition games), wrapped up their exhibition slate on Thursday night at Wells Fargo Center.
With the New Jersey Devils in Prague for the NHL regular season opener on Friday, the New Jersey organization sent their AHL affiliate, the Utica Comets, to represent them in Philadelphia. There were a few players with previous NHL experience, but it was essentially an AHL roster.
The Flyers prevailed, 5-2. Anthony Richard (one goal, two assists, Emil Andrae (one goal, two assists), J.R. Avon (1G), Olle Lycksell (one goal) and Noah Cates (late power play goal) scored for the Flyers. Ivan Fedotov (seven saves on eight shots) and Alexei Kolosov (11 saves on 14 shots) split the goaltending duties roughly in half.
Kevin Labanc recorded a hat trick for the New Jersey side. Isaac Poulter faced 29 shots, stopping 24. There were three fights in the game, including two between Sawyer Boulton and Samuel Laberge.
For more on the game, see the
Postgame 5. Below is the Flyers starting combinations from the preseason closer:
Olle Lycksell - Noah Cates - Anthony Richard
Oscar Eklind- Rodrigo Abols - Garnet Hathaway
Brendan Furry - Jacob Gaucher - Garrett Wilson
Elliot Desnoyers - J.R. Avon - Sawyer Boulton
Emi Andrae - Helge Grans
Adam Ginning - Erik Johnson
Hunter McDonald - Oliver Bonk
Ivan Fedotov
[Alexei Kolosov]