Let’s take a quick break from a terrible team (the Eagles) to talk about a good team (the Flyers).

The NHL season kicks off Wednesday evening, and our local hockey club is opening at home against the scumbag Pittsburgh Penguins, who took government loan money that was intended for small businesses. The Yinzers should be ashamed of themselves.

The Flyers, who did not take government loan money, will feature this opening night roster:

FORWARDS (13) – Nicolas Aube-Kubel (RW), Sean Couturier (C), Joel Farabee (LW), Morgan Frost (C), Claude Giroux (C), Kevin Hayes (C), Travis Konecny (RW), Scott Laughton (C), Oskar Lindblom (LW), Nolan Patrick (C), Michael Raffl (LW), James van Riemsdyk (LW), Jakub Voracek (RW)

DEFENSE (8) – Justin Braun, Mark Friedman, Shayne Gostisbehere, Erik Gustafsson, Robert Hagg, Philippe Myers, Ivan Provorov, Travis Sanheim

GOALTENDERS (2) – Brian Elliott, Carter Hart.

Those names are listed in alphabetical order.

Nice to see the names of Morgan Frost and Nolan Patrick, and talk about forward depth. That is an absolutely stacked group right there. Defensively, we’ll see how they look with the retirement of Matt Niskanen and addition of Erik Gustafsson. Also, it’s nice to go into a Flyers season without crippling anxiety regarding the goaltender position.

Captains for this season will be Claude Giroux with the C and Coots as the permanent alternate. Ivan Provorov is the permanent home alternate, while Kevin Hayes and Jake Voracek will be the rotating road alternates. Got that all straight?

Here is the Taxi Squad:

  • Andy Andreoff (C/LW)
  • Connor Bunnaman (C)
  • Alex Lyon (G)
  • Samuel Morin (LW)
  • Nate Prosser (D)
  • Carsen Twarynski (LW)

Morin is going to be intriguing as a left wing convert. We’ll see how he does.

These are your four players on the injured, non-roster list: Wade Allison (RW), Tanner Laczynski (C), Isaac Ratcliffe (LW), Kirill Ustimenko (G).

And the following 14 players are headed to the great Lehigh Valley:

Chris Bigras (D), Tyson Foerster (RW), Pascal Laberge (RW), Mason Millman (D), Derrick Pouliot (D), Roddy Ross (G), Linus Sandin (RW), Felix Sandstrom (G), Matthew Strome (LW), Max Willman (RW), Zayde Wisdom (RW), Tyler Wotherspoon (D), Wyatte Wylie (D), Egor Zamula (D)

 

(Edit – I’d like to apologize for my gross typo in the second paragraph. I hate the Yinzers so much I rushed that line and screwed it up)