5 THINGS: Flyers vs. Capitals

Interim head coach Mike Yeo's Philadelphia Flyers (15-26-10) will host Peter Laviolette's Washington Capitals (28-16-9) in the Flyers Charities Game at the Wells Fargo Center on Saturday afternoon. Game time at the Wells Fargo Center is 12:30 p.m. (NBCSP, 97.5 The Fanatic).

This is the third of four meetings between the teams this season and the second in Philadelphia. The season series concludes at Capital One Arena on April 12.
Back on Nov. 6, the Flyers improved their early season record to 6-2-2 when they skated to a 2-1 road win over the Capitals. The Flyers played an outstanding opening 40 minutes and then hung on to receive outstanding goaltending the rest of the way Second period goals by Derick Brassard (2nd) and Sean Couturier (5th) held up. Martin Jones turned back 31 of 32 shots including 14 of 15 in a fast-and-furious third period.
Since that time, the Flyers have only won nine games (9-24-8). The club has only won twice so far in the 2022 calendar year: the final game of January and the first game of March.
On Feb. 17 in Philadelphia, the Flyers suffered a galling 5-3 loss to the Capitals. The Flyers led, 3-2, with time ticking below three minutes remaining in regulation and then got buried under a sudden deluge of three unanswered goals .Gerry Mayhew (PPG and 4-on-4) scored twice for Philadelphia. Travis Sanheim also tallied. Jones stopped 20 of 24 shots,
The Flyers enter this game coming off a 4-1 home loss to the St. Louis Blues on Tuesday. Oskar Lindblom tied the game at 1-1 in the third period but the Flyers coughed up a goal on the very next shift and never drew even again. St. Louis tacked on two empty net goals for the final three-goal margin of victory.
On Thursday, the Capitals suffered a 4-1 loss to the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden. Alex Ovechkin's 32nd goal of the season broke up a shutout bid for the Rangers' Igor Sheshterkin (36 saves on 37 shots) with 1:02 remaining in the game. Ilya Samsonov made 17 saves for the Caps in a losing cause.
Here are five things to watch in this game:
1. Farabee and Brassard Return
Flyers winger Joel Farabee, who celebrated his 22nd birthday on Friday, has been out since Jan. 20 with an upper-body injury suffered in a game against the Columbus Blue Jackets. Farabee will make his return to the lineup against the Capitals, skating on Claude Giroux's line. For the season, Farabee has posted 11 goals and 18 points in 33 games played.
Veteran center Derick Brassard will also return to the Flyers' lineup for this game. A nagging and recurring hip issue has limited the 34-year-old to just 20 games played this season (four goals, 11 points). He has dressed in one game apiece in December, January, and February. He last played on Feb. 9 against the Detroit Red Wings. Brassard needs two goals to reach 200 for his NHL career.
Morgan Frost and Max Willman will exit the Flyers' lineup as healthy scratches. The projected Flyers' lineup is as follows (subject to change):
86 Joel Farabee - 28 Claude Giroux - 89 Cam Atkinson
23 Oskar Lindblom - 21 Scott Laughton - 11 Travis Konecny
25 James van Riemsdyk - 19 Derick Brassard- 20 Gerry Mayhew
76 Isaav Ractliffe - 38 Patrick Brown - 18 Zack MacEwen
9 Ivan Provorov - 61 Justin Braun
6 Travis Sanheim - 70 Rasmus Ristolainen
3 Keith Yandle - 24 Nick Seeler
79 Cart Hart
[35 Martin Jones]
PP1: Giroux, JVR, Farabee, Atkinson, Yandle.
PP2: Brassard, Ratcliffe, Konecny, Mayhew, Provorov.
2. Refresh start for Hart
Carter Hart has missed the last two games with an eye infection. He practiced on Thursday and Friday with the team and will make his return to the starter's net for this game against Washington. Hart exited the NHL All-Star break with a .915 save percentage (tied for 16th leaguewide). Other than Giroux, Hart was arguably the Flyers' best and most consistent player in the pre-All-Star portion of the 2021-22 season.
Hart struggled against Detroit in his first outing after the All-Star break, allowing two goals he'd normally stop amid a 6-3 defeat. His next start was a rematch in Detroit, stopping 20 of 23 shots in a losing cause. Hart made 18 second period saves in Pittsburgh on Feb. 15, and the Flyers took a 4-2 lead into the latter half of the third period. Suddenly, a bad penalty by Isaac Ratcliffe led to a Jake Guentzel power play goal (Hart had little to no chance at a save) and it was followed up by a game-tying Chad Ruhewedel goal on a seeing-eye shot just 18 seconds of game play later. On the opening shift of overtime, a Claude Giroux turnover, a 2-on-1 for Kris Letang and Sidney Crosby and a five-hole goal from the left circle by Letang ended the game.
Jones made a scheduled start against the Capitals at the Wells Fargo Center two nights later. Hart was initially slated to get the Feb. 21 game against Carolina (4-3 overtime loss) but came down with an eye infection and was unable to play due to impaired vision. Jones got the start with youngster Kirill Ustimenko recalled from the Lehigh Valley Phantoms as an emergency backup. The next evening, the Flyers hosted the Blues. Hart was still not quite ready to return, so Jones once again got the call.
3. Inside the Numbers
The Flyers enter this game with a minus-21 goal differential (91 GF - 112 GA) at 5-on-5 play. The Capitals are plus-25 (118 GF/ 93 GA). Additionally, the Flyers have fared very poorly in late-game desperation situations in which they've had to pull their goalie for an extra attacker. The Flyers have scored once and allowed 15 empty netters. Only the Red Wings (18) and the Seattle Kraken (16) have allowed more. Meanwhile, the Flyers have scored twice at 6-on-5.
The Capitals' season so far may not quite measure up to what the team has accomplished in recent past seasons. Nonetheless, it is notable that the Caps have scored the game's first goal 35 times this season (22-9-4 record) and, in the 18 games where an opponent has scored first, the team is still a respectable 6-7-5 (leaguewide, the team that scores first, on average, wins nearly 70 percent of the time). The Flyers have scored first in 21 games this season (12-3-6) and given up the first goal 30 times (3-23-4).
The Flyers have only taken a lead into the third period a mere nine times all season (6-0-3). The Caps have done so 22 times (17-2-3).

4. Behind Enemy Lines: Washington Capitals
The Capitals have slogged along to a .500 record over their last 10 games, going 5-5-0 in that span. The team has won three of its last five tilts. Last time Washington played the Flyers, it was the Capitals fourth line that did most of the damage. Garnet Hathaway scored the game-tying (a deflection off his leg) and game-winning (a goal from the slot after an Ivan Provorov turnover), with veteran Carl Hagelin setting up both goal sequences. Earlier in the game, the Caps' fourth line produced a goal against the Giroux line, with Hathaway and Nic Dowd assisting on a screened goal by Michal Kempny.
Ovechkin, a perennial contender for the Rocket Richard Trophy, is four goals behind Toronto's Auston Matthews (36 goals) at present for the NHL's goal-scoring lead. Leading the Capitals with 63 points in 51 games played, Ovechkin is eighth in the Art Ross Trophy race. Playking center Evgeny Kuznetsov leads the team and is tied for 21st in the NHL with 34 assists, while veteran offensive defenseman John Carlson has 30 assists among his 40 points.
Veteran center Nicklas Bäckström has had an injury-affected season and has struggled of late (1g, 0a and a minus-six rating over his last five games). He remains one assist away from passing Flyers Hall of Fame center Rod Brind'Amour (732) for the 48th on the NHL's all-time leaderboard. The playmaking Swedish pivot is six points away from reaching 1,000 in his regular season career.
In the game against the Rangers, T.J. Oshie returned after missing more than a month with an upper-body injury. The veteran logged 20:06 of ice time.
Defenseman Justin Schultz also returned to the Caps' lineup in the game against the Rangers (17:19 TOI). He remains banged up and took a maintenance day on Friday but, as of this writing, is expected to be available to play against the Flyers.
Samsonov has appeared in 30 games this season, posting a 17-8-3 record, 2.88 goals against average, .904 save percentage and three shutouts. Teammate Vitek Vanecek (10-6-5, 2.39 GAA, ,915 SV%, 2 SO) has been out with an upper-body injury but has returned to the ice for training and was with the team in New York. Pheonix Copley (2 GP) has been backing up Samsonov with Vanecek sidelined.
Projected lineup (subject to change)
8 Alex Ovechkin - 92 Evgeny Kuznetsov - 73 Conor Sheary
91 Joe Snively - 19 Nicklas Bäckström - 43 Tom Wilson
24 Connor McMichael - 20 Lars Eller - 77 T.J. Oshie
62 Carl Hagelin - 26 Nic Dowd - 21 Garnet Hathaway
42 Martin Fehervary - 74 John Carlson
9 Dmitry Orlov - 3 Nick Jensen
57 Trevor van Riemsdyk - 2 Justin Schultz
30 Ilya Samsonov
[1 Pheonix Copley]
PP1: Ovechkin, Kuznetsov, Bäckström, Oshie, Carlson
PP2: Wilson, Eller, Sheary, Schultz, Orlov
5. Players to Watch: Konecny and Wilson
Travis Konecny has been using his natural skating ability and aggressiveness more effectively in recent weeks. Rather than slowing down or allowing himself to be confined to the perimeter, he's been beating defenders one-on-one with some regularity. Goals have remained elusive (eight in 49 games overall, one tally in the last 12 games) but he's been setting up teammates with regularity. Konecny brings a career-high seven-game point streak (1g, 6a) into this game and has collected an assist in six straight matches, including the most recent game against the Capitals.
Opponents know they have to have their head on a swivel continuously whenever Tom Wilson is on the ice for Washington. The often-controversial power forward has avoided any suspensions so far this season, and was named to NHL All-Star Game for the first time (as a replacement for Ovechkin). He's shown an ability to produce offense when paired with high-skill linemates, and he brings 15 goals and 34 points on the season into this game. Wilson was held quiet in the Feb. 17 game against the Flyers and has two goals and three points in his last six games. Wilson leads all Caps forwards with 142 credited hits (tied with defenseman Martin Fehervary for the team lead) and his 65 penalty minutes are also the most on the club.