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Flyers are a +275 Series Underdog Against Carolina Hurricanes
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Game 1 between the Flyers and the Carolina Hurricanes on Saturday night. 8 p.m. on ABC. The Sixers and Celtics game is 7:30 p.m. on NBC, so thank god almighty that we don’t have any ridiculous streaming nonsense going on. No Peacock or Prime Video or any of that.
As expected, the Flyers are a significant series underdog against the Canes, who are one of the NHL’s best teams. The Orange and Black are +275 to win the series at bet365 and sitting around +165 on the Game 1 moneyline. That amounts to a ~36% win chance at Kalshi:
It’s good payout if you believe in the Flyers in Game 1. They’ll have two full rest days following Game 6, in which they appeared to be running on fumes at times. Carolina swept the Senators and they haven’t played since Saturday, so they’re coming into this one with an entire week to recuperate and prepare. Maybe the rust angle ends up being a thing, maybe not.
Injury-wise, the Flyers are clean. Nothing notable. Carolina has Alexander Nikishin day-to-day with a concussion and Nikolaj Ehlers day-to-day with a lower body, and those two guys are key components to a relatively stacked team. Their status will swing the odds, especially Ehlers, who was their second-leading point producer in the regular season.
For what it’s worth, the Flyers did battle the Canes this season. You can throw the most recent game out the window, the Flyers’ playoff clincher, since Carolina sat their top guys on the front end of a road/road back-to-back to finish their year. There was a 4-3 overtime loss in Raleigh way back on October 11th, when Sam Ersson started in net. The Flyers battled back from a 3-2 third period deficit to claim a road point in that one.
Then there was the weekend series in mid-December, a pair of shootout losses, one at home and one on the road. Ersson played the first game and Vladar the second, and what sticks out the most is that the Flyers scored in the third period two nights in a row to force overtime and get a point. NHL fans of loser teams lamented the Flyers getting into the playoffs with OT and shootout points, but they battled to keep these games close and it’s what kept them in the playoff picture through the Olympic break.
On the surface, your gut probably tells you that the Flyers are gonna be outgunned in this series. But how many people picked them to beat the Penguins? That’s why you gotta throw it all out the window in the postseason.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com