Feisty Flyers, Matvei Michkov’s confidence, and other observations from the team’s training camp scrimmage

From one of the perches overlooking the rink at the Flyers Training Center, Rick Tocchet got a bird’s-eye view of not just a packed house of fans eager for another postseason appearance, but also where things stand on Day 3 of Flyers training camp.

“I really enjoyed watching the competitiveness from all the guys,” the coach said, noting that he started to see players implement some strategies and plans they had worked on the first two days.

“I don’t want guys to kill anybody, but some guys want to show an impression to people, and I’ll never take that away from somebody. I don’t want stupidity, but I do like competitiveness, for sure.”

It was quite competitive, with several scrums and hard hits as the team worked on five-on-five, four-on-four, three-on-three, and special teams. Team Orange won, 4-3, behind goals from Alex Bump, Trevor Zegras, Denver Barkey, and Oliver Bonk. Danila Klimovich, Tyson Foerster, and Helge Grans scored for Team Black, which had to do mountains — or what some sports would call lines, in which you touch the closest blue line and skate back to the start and do that with every line on the ice — twice for losing.

Here are our observations of the Flyers training camp scrimmage:

Tocchet mentioned last year that he likes to keep pairs together, and early on it looks like several are carrying over from last season. On Team Black, Travis Konecny and Porter Martone have been together since the start of camp and flashed the connection they had after Martone joined the team. Noah Cates and Foerster, paired up since the John Tortorella era, were on a line, played on the same power-play unit, and penalty-killed together like usual. Zegras centered a line with Owen Tippett, rekindling their connection toward the end of last season and in the playoffs, as did Barkey and Matvei Michkov. Defensively, Travis Sanheim and Rasmus Ristolainen and Cam York and Jamie Drysdale were reunited.

Stop if you’ve heard this one before: the power play was not good. The expected top unit, with Drysdale at the point and Barkey, Zegras, Tippett, and Michkov, had trouble getting set up or, when they did, finding offense. The second unit generated a bit more and had David Jiříček up top with Foerster, Cates, Martone, and Konecny. That group seemed to be rotating around the zone, and Foerster looked to the rafters after getting robbed by Dan Vladař in front. Speaking of the goalies, Vladař and Joseph Woll looked solid between the pipes and didn’t allow any goals during their half of the scrimmage.

» READ MORE: An early order of business for the Flyers this preseason? Perfecting the power play.

Defenseman Nick Seeler, who, unsurprisingly, was paired with projected No. 6 blueliner Jiříček, noted that the ice got chippy as the scrimmage wore on — bad for moving the puck on the power play but good for the penalty killers like him, he said with a grin — but so did the players. Michkov and Hunter McDonald got into it in front of the away bench, and Martone and Spencer Gill later put each other in headlocks along the boards. They went at it for a while, which led to a big scrum in which Konecny also jabbed Zegras and newcomer Simon Benoit, who was paired with Gill. Martone did grab his right wrist afterward but continued in the scrimmage and had a scoring chance, although it appeared he was favoring the hand at times between whistles.

“You don’t want to cross the line; trying to keep it clean. You don’t wish any ill will upon any of the guys. So, yeah, you try to ride that line. I think some of the guys were getting a little upset with me today, but, you know, that’s just part of my game,” said Ty Murchison, who dumped Sanheim into the end boards early on before playing tough on Cole Knuble the same shift. Murchison entered camp as someone expecting to push for a roster spot and played a smart defensive game by breaking up passes, showing his smooth skating, stepping up at the blue line as he did to Jett Luchanko, and being physical. He appeared to pick up right where he left off at the Rookie Series with his physicality but didn’t drop the gloves as he did then with Rangers prospect Dylan Roobroeck.

» READ MORE: Roster hopeful Ty Murchison has already caught the eye of the Flyers’ brass with a strong rookie camp

During the first two days of camp, it was apparent that Michkov worked on his skating and game shape during the offseason. He showed Saturday that his passing game remains top-notch, like his passes to Bump and Bonk for goals. However, his work beforehand on each goal stood out. On the Bump goal, he made the play despite knowing he would pay physically from a hit by Konecny that took him out. On Bonk’s goal, with physical winger Noah Powell all over him during three-on-three action, Michkov showed a renewed ability to stay strong on pucks, protecting it as he squeezed through checks from Powell along the end boards and, while being knocked around, kept the puck on his stick before the pass. Throughout the scrimmage, he kept his feet moving and drove through guys, especially down the boards, like when he went hard against the 6-foot-4 Ristolainen in the corner.

“He’s more confident this year than last year in camp, for me, personally,” Tocchet said. “And the stuff in the corner, we talked about when he left for Russia, I said to him, ‘This is where you can really be really good for us’ … because he could hold on to the puck. I’m not going to compare him to [Jaromir] Jagr, but the Jagr-type holding onto it, butt sticking out, taking a hit, but still holding on to the puck.

“... You can tell he’s worked on his game, and you can see the not dropoff after 25 seconds out there, like he’s still skating. So that’s the credit to him, working hard in the summer.”

» READ MORE: Danny Brière wants to swing big to turn the Flyers into contenders. He might face a happy problem. | Mike Sielski

Because each team needed three centers, and with Cates centering Foerster and either Powell or Nolan Foote and Sean Couturier between Noel Acciari, with whom he also penalty-killed, and Carl Grundström, Barkey and Zegras got a chance to play down the middle. Zegras said Friday that he wants to play center, and he played well with Tippett — the two combined for Zegras’ goal after stealing the puck from Konecny — and a rotation of newcomers in Zach Aston-Reese and Jack Studnicka on the left side. Barkey showed chemistry with Michkov and noted that they work well, especially on give-and-go plays. This summer, Barkey had meetings with the coaching staff about his play as a centerman and worked on a few things, and, if the opportunity persists, plans on leaning on his veteran teammates.

“I think as time goes on here, if I continue to stay there, I think Coots will be a big one, [to] pick the brain of him,” he said. “Selke winner, someone who knows how to play the game the right way. He plays on the defensive side of the puck and the offensive side of the puck very well. And just a guy that’s reliable; you can put him out there in any situation and rely on him, so definitely going to be someone that, yeah, as time goes on here, start working with him after practice or whatever it is, pick his brain and see if I can implement some things, see if he’s got pointers to help me out.”

With 10 forwards on each team, Christian Dvorak floated to other lines but mostly was between Konecny and Martone. … Knuble showed his motor and hockey sense early and often, skating with Cates and Foerster. … Luchanko centered a line with a rotation of Powell, Foote, and Klimovich on his wings. … Bonk looked strong on both ends of the ice and got a chance to play the bumper — “Bumper Bonk” is back! — on a late power-play unit that included Bump, Couturier, Studnicka, and York at the point. … The Flyers are off on Sunday. On Monday, they head to Hershey to face the Washington Capitals for their first preseason game (7 p.m., NBCSP). … The Flyers trimmed the roster by 15. Forwards Brady Berard, Alex Čiernik, Devin Kaplan, Owen McLaughlin, Ilya Pautov, and Zayde Wisdom and defensemen Jackson Edward and Andrew Perrott were assigned to Lehigh Valley of the American Hockey League. Forwards Nathan Quinn (Quebec) and KJ Sauer (Edmonton), defensemen Maksim Sokolovskii (London), Brek Liske (Everett), Luke Vlooswyk (Everett) and goalies Martin Psohlavec (Saskatoon) and Marek Sklenička (Seattle) have been reassigned to their junior teams. Forty-two players remain in camp. Matthew Gard (Seattle) is the only junior player remaining on the roster.