‘Take ice time away ... Scratch guys if we have to’: Mike Yeo plans a response after Flyers reach new low

While the Flyers have been victims of injury misfortune and unlucky bounces this season, they have no one to blame but themselves for their brutal 4-3 overtime loss to the Montreal Canadiens on Sunday night.

With a minute remaining in regulation, the Flyers couldn’t have scripted a more perfect scenario to close out the game — up by one against the league-worst Canadiens, the Flyers were heading for the power play after Joel Farabee drew an interference call.

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But even with 55 years of combined NHL experience, the Flyers’ power-play members couldn’t play keep-away with the puck for a minute. After Claude Giroux won the faceoff, the Flyers had possession for four seconds before turning the puck over to the Canadiens. Rem Pitlick scored a shorthanded goal to tie the game with 47 seconds left, and the Flyers fell in overtime on a Cole Caufield slapshot despite having 1:43 of power-play time between the remainder of the third period and overtime.

His voice dripping with frustration after the game, interim coach Mike Yeo delivered the same back-to-the-drawing-board message he’s used all season long after back-breaking losses:

“We’re going to have to keep finding ways to get players to understand that you can play the way you want to play or you can play winning hockey,” Yeo said.

After a similarly unacceptable loss earlier this season — a 6-3 Buffalo Sabres trouncing on Jan. 22 — Yeo discussed the difference between playing in the NHL and playing winning hockey in the NHL. At the time, the Flyers’ roster featured AHL regulars in Morgan Frost, Wade Allison, Max Willman, Gerry Mayhew, Jackson Cates, and Cam York.

“There’s a fine line between trying to make sure you don’t crush confidence that’s not there, but at the same time, we can’t accept less than good performances right now,” Yeo said after the Sabres game.

But now, with the return of players from injury, including Kevin Hayes, Farabee, and Derick Brassard, the Flyers’ roster has more experience than it did back in January. Frost and York have played in 10 and seven additional NHL games, respectively, since Jan. 22.

The team is healthier, more veteran, more experienced, but still hasn’t learned from its repeated mistakes. Two weeks ago, Yeo tried to send a message about playing with a winning attitude in a team meeting after the Flyers’ March 3 loss to the Minnesota Wild. The Flyers went on to win two games and were sporadically competitive in consecutive losses to division leaders in the Florida Panthers and the Carolina Hurricanes. On Sunday, they choked against the lowly Canadiens.

After the game, Yeo suggested that it’s time to issue another warning call to his tenured NHL regulars. How?

“Take ice time away,” Yeo said after the game on Sunday. “Put guys on the fourth line. Scratch guys if we have to. I don’t even know if we have enough. Call guys up. These are veteran players we’re going to have to do it to, too. Got to get the job done.”

Even throughout losing streaks of 10 games (Nov. 18-Dec. 8), a franchise-worst 13 games (Dec. 30-Jan. 25), and six games (Feb. 9-Feb. 22), former head coach Alain Vigneault, and now Yeo, have seldom resorted to healthy-scratching regulars. For most of the season, the Flyers didn’t have the luxury of benching those players because they had so many others out due to injury.

Yeo has experimented with changing responsibilities, such as taking Ivan Provorov off the power play in favor of York. Now, with the lineup close to full health (save for the absences of Ryan Ellis and Sean Couturier), Cam Atkinson understands that Yeo has every right to send a message and scratch veterans.

“We’ve gotten some guys back from injury and I think you have to hold people accountable,” Atkinson said. “Plain and simple, no matter who you are, where you are in the lineup, older guy, younger guy.”

As Yeo said after the Wild loss, the coaches will continue to push for more from their players, but ultimately, change starts with the players — “They have to grab hold of this,” Yeo said on March 3. “That’s how we’re gonna do it because if we don’t have complete engagement, complete buy-in to each other and the way that we have to play the game, then we’re not gonna win.”

Yeo can scratch veterans and call up players from the Phantoms. But ultimately, the players must be the ones at the helm of salvaging what’s left of the season and holding each other accountable after the Flyers fell to a new low on Sunday night.

“It’s frustration,” goalie Carter Hart said of the mood in the locker room. ”But thank God, we’ve got a couple days here to reset. Tough loss, but we’ve got to put it behind us and prepare for a busy stretch of games coming up.”