PITTSBURGH — Five Flyers are expected to make their Stanley Cup playoff debuts tonight in Pittsburgh. Defenseman Ivan Provorov is perhaps the most relied upon rookie out of that group, which also includes Travis Sanheim, Travis Konecny, Nolan Patrick and Oskar Lindblom.
Provorov and Patrick will attempt to draw on their extensive playoff experience with the Brandon Wheat Kings in the Western Hockey League as a starting point for the intensity, speed and physicality that comes with the NHL postseason.
“I think that experience helped us both a lot,” Provorov said. “We learned how to win in the playoffs and play long series against teams and how to wear teams down.
“I just look at it the same. The level is going to elevate. The physical part is going to come. I think both of us are ready for that and I’m just going to go out there and give everything I have."
Together, in back-to-back seasons, Provorov and Patrick played 40 games in the WHL Playoffs, advancing to the Memorial Cup tournament in 2016.
Hagg sits
Flyers head coach Dave Hakstol spent several minutes on the ice before Wednesday’s morning skate speaking one-on-one with rookie defenseman Robert Hagg, whose physical style and positional play would be ideally suited for a playoff series.
“He just came up to me and told me to be ready and that you never know what’s going to happen in the playoffs,” Hagg said. “He just told me to put my work in and you need to be ready.”
NHL
As one of the last Flyers off the ice during practice and morning skates, Hagg has put in the necessary work but has been a healthy scratch over the final eight games of the regular season.
“When you haven’t played in a while, you have to keep up physically and try not to be gassed after two shifts,” Hagg said. “It’s different when you practice all the time and then go into a game. You can limit that a little bit by practicing good and practicing hard to get prepared.”
A three-peat in Pittsburgh?
The talk swirling around Pittsburgh is the possibility of winning three straight Stanley Cups for the first time since the Islanders ripped off four straight from 1980-83.
The Flyers find themselves in the unenviable task of trying to take down a team that has won its last eight postseason series since it was eliminated by the Rangers in five games in the first round of the 2015 Stanley Cup Playoffs.
According to head coach Mike Sullivan, understanding roles and the bigger picture is a big part of that success.
“Our team is very well aware of what our identity is,” Sullivan said. “I think to a man our players understand what their contribution is in helping this team be successful and now we’ve got to go out there and play our game and we’ve got to embrace the challenge.”
Projected lines, pairings, scratches
Claude Giroux-Sean Couturier-Michael Raffl
Oskar Lindblom-Nolan Patrick-Jakub Voracek
Travis Konecny-Valtteri Filppula-Wayne Simmonds
Scott Laughton-Jori Lehtera-Matt Read
Ivan Provorov-Shayne Gostisbehere
Travis Sanheim-Andrew MacDonald
Brandon Manning-Radko Gudas
Brian Elliott
Petr Mrazek
Scratches: Jordan Weal, Robert Hagg, Taylor Leier, Dale Weise, Johnny Oduya