Trevor Zegras heads to the locker room with an apparent injury as the Flyers extend their lead against Utah tonight.
The game is still live as this is written, with 2:44 left in the third period. The final result isn't in, and Philadelphia still has to close it out.
The Flyers needed a night like this. They enter it at 3-8-4 and lost three straight, the last one a 5-2 loss in Washington on Wednesday.
There is no word yet on what happened to Zegras or how serious it is. He has no injury listed as of today, so anything beyond "apparent" would be a guess.
The timing stings because Zegras has been one of the few Flyers producing. He arrives with 13 points in 15 games, including four goals and nine assists, and five of those assists have come on the power play.
His minus-5 rating shows how rough the team's season has been, but the production is real. Philadelphia has scored 29 goals all year and given up 51, so any lost offense matters.
Rick Tocchet has been moving pieces around for a week. Trevor Zegras getting center time in the line shuffle was the latest tweak, and it put him in the middle of the lineup.
What a Zegras absence would do to the Flyers' lines
If Zegras can't return, the middle of the lineup gets thin again. Tocchet would be rebuilding the lines on the fly, and that's the last thing a team on a losing run wants.
The Flyers have already dealt with absences this week. They went into Washington without Travis Konecny or Owen Tippett, as we covered when Konecny and Tippett were out before the Capitals game, and the result was a 5-2 loss.
Adding Zegras to that list would hollow out the top six. Daniel Briere's group isn't built to absorb that kind of hit, not with a 1-5-1 road record that makes every home point essential.
Philadelphia is 2-3-8 hmm
The home mark of 2-3-3 hasn't exactly been a cushion either, so tonight's finish carries real weight. A win would end the skid, but the bigger question is who suits up next.
The Flyers host Minnesota on Tuesday, November 3. Whether Zegras is in the lineup for that one is the update everyone in Philadelphia will be waiting on.
