Lost in the hysteria of Bryce Harper, his massive contract signed with the Phillies, his plane trip from Las Vegas to Clearwater, his press conference, his forearms, his reasons for wearing No. 3, his malapropism when saying D.C. instead of Philly, his not-so-subtle recruitment of Mike Trout to be his teammate in two years and Le’Veon Bell for the Eagles and his first batting practice has been something else brewing in Philadelphia Sports:

The Flyers are making an unprecedented playoff push.

There have been three road games the Flyers played amid Harper hysteria – an overtime loss to Columbus Thursday and convincing wins over New Jersey Friday and the New York Islanders Sunday.

With that successful little trip, the Flyers enter the final month of the season five points out of a playoff spot with 16 games to play. They trail both the Penguins and Canadiens, who are in those final two Wild Card spots by five points and Columbus, who is the first team on the outside-looking in, by three points.

Both the Penguins and Blue Jackets have a game in hand on the Flyers and all three teams have an advantage over the Flyers in regulation wins, which is the first tiebreaker. Pittsburgh and Montreal each have 33 and Columbus has 36 while the Flyers have just 30.

So, the journey is still steep. But not as steep as it was in early January when the team was 16 points out of a playoff spot and dead last in the league in the standings.

But we’ve been over this before.

We’ve identified myriad reasons why the Flyers turnaround has been so unexpected and, whether they ultimately get to the postseason or not, wildly successful.

Carter Hart was getting the brunt of the love, and rightfully so, until he hurt his ankle and has been sidelined for the past 10 days.

Improved defensive play was also identified – as the Flyers have been starting to see the real Ivan Provorov, Travis Sanheim has exploded onto the stat sheet recently but has been mostly excellent since being paired with Provorov, Radko Gudas, despite a brief suspension, has been rock solid on the blue line all year, Phil Myers is getting his shot now and so far has not done anything to make you think he doesn’t belong and despite a ton of inconsistency all season, Shayne Gostisbehere has been better in the past couple weeks.

Nolan Patrick, despite a scary injury that knocked him out of Sunday’s game against the Islanders, has been really good, even if he’s not scoring a ton. His all-around game has vastly improved, and Oskar Lindblom has become a productive staple in the lineup.

Claude Giroux is Claude Giroux, which doesn’t jump out at you, but is so consistently good that every once in awhile you have to say, “yeah, he’s still awesome.” Meanwhile Sean Couturier continues to show why he is the best two-way forward in the NHL this season.

So yeah, all of these things have had something to do with the Flyers resurgence. But the one thing that hasn’t really been identified as a reason things are moving in the right direction has been coaching.

Scott Gordon has done an excellent job with the Flyers, first putting out the dumpster fire and then helping the team out of the smoldering rubbish and back onto the pavement outside of it.

The Record Speaks for Itself

When the Flyers fired former coach Dave Hakstol, it was at a time when Chuck Fletcher didn’t want to make that decision.

He sort of had his hand forced. He wanted to be more patient. He wanted to figure out how best to proceed. He likely was going to look elsewhere for a replacement for Hakstol eventually, but until that time arose, there was no reason to part with Hakstol in his mind.

However, reports started to surface that Hakstol was going to be fired and that former Chicago Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville was going to be the new coach.

It turned out those reports were wrong in their timing, albeit not wrong when it came to the Flyers intent.

See, the Flyers wanted to pursue Quenneville, if not Fletcher specifically, his big boss, Comcast-Spectacor chairman and CEO Dave Scott wanted Quenneville bad. He could see the apathy with the Flyers fan base setting in and knew that bringing in a coach with cache, namely three Stanley Cups this decade, would stir their emotional interest in the Flyers.

The thing is, neither Quenneville nor Fletcher were ready for this possibility. Time was needed to see if it could eventually be a good pairing.

But Hakstol was no dummy. He could see what was going on around him and requested a meeting with Fletcher trying to get a sense on where he fit into the Flyers future, if at all.

Fletcher is a straight shooter. He was honest with Hakstol, and it left the team in a tough spot with a known lame duck as coach. Fletcher needed to make a change in that moment, even if he didn’t want to do it so soon.

With Fletcher having not even had a chance to speak to Quenneville yet, the Flyers had to make a change. They put their collective heads together (Fletcher, President Paul Holmgren and senior vice president Bob Clarke) and decided to name Gordon the interim coach for the rest of the season, a role that was originally going to be Hakstol’s to hold onto until the Spring.

There were no real expectations for Gordon. After all, his previous stint in the NHL as a head coach was relatively unmemorable. His time with the New York Islanders was brief and the team was bad. And, after two-and-a-quarter seasons, he was fired.

He took an assistant coaching job with Toronto, but he always seemed to find the most joy in coaching at the AHL level, where he had success teaching young players how to find their game so they can make it to the NHL.

Giving Gordon an interim title was meant to just take off the pressure for the rest of the season. If the Flyers continued to stink, no big deal. If they showed a pulse and a heartbeat, it would justify the firing of Hakstol and suggest to Quenneville that there was enough talent here that he would consider being wooed to take over a flawed team, even if it had some promise.

But no one saw this coming. Not Fletcher. Not Holmgren. Not Clarke. Heck, not even Gordon himself.

Since taking the reins, Gordon has led the Flyers to a 20-11-4 record in 35 games. It’s almost half a season now, so it’s starting to get close to a good sample size.

Even better than that, since losing in Washington back on Jan. 8 in D.C., Gordon has guided the Flyers to a 17-4-2 mark in 23 games. – which is more than a quarter of the season.

And the team doesn’t appear to be showing signs of slowing down.

Hart was a big part of it, sure, going 13-8-1 in 22 starts since getting the call up at the start of Gordon’s tenure. But, despite the mostly stellar play of the 20-year-old goalie, the Flyers also have points in 10 of the 13 games not started by Hart.

In fact, goalies not named Hart are 6-0-2 since that Jan. 8 date.

So yeah, credit Hart for some of the success, he certainly deserves it, but this isn’t just about good goaltending now.

The Players Believe in Gordon

This is more about roles and guys buying into them. This is more about communication and transparency with a coach who says he finally understands how to talk to younger players. This is more about creating an environment where the team believes in itself.

That’s all Gordon.

If the Flyers make the playoffs, he’s got to be a finalist for the Jack Adams Award as coach of the year, no? He’s not going to win it, not with the job Barry Trotz has done in New York with the Islanders a season after losing their franchise player, but notice needs to be taken as to what he has created with this team.

They still make mistakes – but not as many.

They still give up a lot of shots – but have taken away more of the higher percentage kind.

They are getting to the net and making things happen offensively.

Players are being told why they are playing where they are playing and what their expectation is in those roles rather than be forced to figure it out themselves.

Sometimes, it’s not a punishment. Sometimes, putting Giroux, Couturier and Jake Voracek together for a period is something that needs to be done to try and jump start the offense and is not an indictment of Travis Konency’s play.

Sometimes moving guys like Michael Raffl and Scott Laughton all over the lineup is worth it – as evidenced by a need for Laughton to fill in for an injured Voracek Sunday and delivering in a more featured role. This is something that a younger Laughton wouldn’t have bought into, but does wholeheartedly now, making him an incredibly valuable piece to this Flyers puzzle.

Sometimes giving a player more responsibility – like Sanheim on the top unit, or counting on Hart as the starting goalie, or not taking Myers out of the lineup once he’s in it – is the right course of action.

Sometimes dressing seven defensemen, while not ideal for rotations, is the best course of action for a team and its morale on a given night.

Gordon doesn’t make every decision alone. He has help from all of his assistants – Ian Laperriere, Kris Knoblauch and most importantly, defensively anyway, Rick Wilson – but he still has the final say.

And his methodology is working. It’s working far more than any coach since Peter Laviolette was punching his own players in the head with excitement.

In conclusion… 

Maybe, just maybe, this guy is the coach the Flyers need long-term.

Yes, Quenneville is still out there, and yes, bringing in a coach with such a glowing track record is enticing, but how he fits with the players on your team is a great unknown.

What is known is these players like playing for Gordon – and it shows.

I’m sure the hockey people see it. I’m sure they are willing to consider it beyond this season. And maybe Dave Scott is seeing that fans will buy in without a big name coach as long as the team is successful and competes.

He should, because the Flyers have something good going with Gordon and shouldn’t let that go while chasing rainbows so that another team can benefit Gordon instead.