Thanks to a surplus of draft picks he stockpiled, Flyers GM Daniel Briere was able to land a much-needed center to play on one of the top two lines.
Goodbye, playoff drought?
OK, adding Zegras alone isn’t going to end the Flyers’ string of futility – five straight years without a playoff spot, just one playoff-series win in the last 13 seasons.
But it’s a start.
Now, Briere must improve the Flyers’ massive hole in the net, where his team was last in the NHL in save percentage (.879) last season and 28th out of 32 teams in goals-against per game (3.45). (Yes, the defense was partially to blame.)
Briere was able to acquire the creative Zegras at a surprisingly modest price: sending the Anaheim Ducks fourth-line center Ryan Poehling and a second-round draft pick (45th overall) this year and a fourth-rounder in 2026. The Flyers still have six picks left in the first two rounds later this week, including three in Round 1.
For the Flyers, the 24-year-old Zegras checks all the boxes. He’s young, shifty on his skates and, when healthy, productive. Oh, and he plays the position the Flyers desperately needed to bolster.
Selected ninth overall in the 2019 NHL draft and once touted as the face of Anaheim’s franchise, Zegras was named to the NHL’s all-rookie team in 2021-22 and had back-to-back 60-plus-point seasons in his first two years in the league.
Plagued by injuries this past season, he managed 12 goals and 32 points in 57 games, playing mostly at wing. The previous year, injuries limited him to 15 points in 31 games.
So Zegras – who had back-to-back 23-goal seasons earlier in his career – is on a mission to show he can stay healthy for an 82-game campaign. If successful, the Flyers hope he will jump-start a power play that was 30th in the NHL and an offense that ranked 24th.
The Philadelphia Flyers Get An Early Steal By Trading For Trevor ZegrasLast week, Philadelphia Flyers GM Daniel Briere spoke about the difficulty of acquiring a first- or second-line center.
Briere will have his sights on the draft Friday and Saturday. He will also keep an eye on adding a goalie in the near future.
Jake Allen, Ilya Samsonov, Dan Vladar, Alex Lyon, Ville Husso, Anton Forsberg and Vitek Vanecek are among the UFAs. Allen (2.59 GAA, .908 save percentage) is the best of the mediocre group, and Briere, who has the draft picks to make a deal, may have to trade for a goalie. If oft-injured Vancouver Canucks goalie Thatcher Demko becomes available in the final year of his contract, there’s the option of reuniting with former Canucks coach Rick Tocchet. St. Louis Blues backup Joel Hofer also surfaced in trade speculation, although GM Doug Armstrong put a stop to it.
On average, the Flyers have finished 26th out of 32 teams in goals allowed over the past five seasons. That, of course, has contributed mightily to missing the playoffs in each season during that span.
But their overall defensive issues go well beyond the last five years. The Flyers have not had a top-10 finish in fewest goals allowed in 19 of the last 20 years, finishing in the bottom-third during most of those seasons.
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