The Vancouver Canucks will take another shot at picking up their first win of the season when they host the Philadelphia Flyers tonight at Rogers Arena.
The Canucks let leads of 3-0 and 4-1 get away in a 6-5 overtime loss to Calgary on Wednesday. Tonight marks the first game of the season for the Flyers – one of five teams that have yet to play a game.

What we saw

For the second straight game, the Canucks held an optional morning skate. Yes, that is former teammates Alex Edler and Dan Hamhuis having a conversation in the stands. This is Edler’s big night to be honoured by the hockey club and such he has a stall set up in the Canucks locker room.
Kevin Lankinen makes his first start as a Canuck. The 29-year-old Finn went 0-1-1 with a 2.43 GAA and 89.8 save percentage in his two exhibition appearances. In addition to Lankinen, Pius Suter and Noah Juulsen will also draw into the line-up tonight.
While there weren’t enough bodies on the ice this morning to run through line combinations, it is expected the Canucks will line-up as follows:
Heinen-Miller-Boeser
DeBrusk-Pettersson-Sprong
Suter-Räty-Garland
Höglander-Blueger-Sherwood
Hughes-Hronek
Soucy-Myers
Forbort-Juulsen
Lankinen
Brock Boeser scored twice on Wednesday night to grab the early team lead in goals while JT Miller and Quinn Hughes also had two point nights. In all, 11 different players found the scoresheet against the Flames.
The Flyers start their season with games on back to back nights in Vancouver and Calgary. They went 4-3 in the preseason and posted a record of 38-33-11 in the 2023-24 NHL season. Travis Konecny led the team in goals, assists and points with 33+35=68.
Captain Sean Couturier needs two points for 500 in his NHL career.
18-year-old Jett Luchanko – born August 21, 2006 – will become the youngest player in Flyers history and is the youngest player in the NHL this season. Meanwhile 19-year-old Matvei Mitchkov makes his much-anticipated NHL debut tonight. The highly-touted seventh overall pick in the 2023 NHL Draft led Philly with 4+3=7 in the preseason.
Samuel Ersson is expected to get the start in goal tonight.
The Flyers beat the Canucks 2-0 and 4-1 last season. Philadelphia was the only team in the league the Canucks did not take a point off last season and one of only two teams along with Colorado (0-2-1) the Canucks did not defeat. These teams will meet again next Saturday in Philadelphia to conclude their two-game regular season series.
Tonight’s referees: Graham Skilliter & Kyle Rehman
Tonight’s broadcasters: John Shorthouse & Ray Ferraro
Tonight’s anthem: Elizabeth Irving

What we heard

Rick Tocchet knows John Tortorella will have the Flyers ready for their season opener:  “You play a team that likes to pressure, you have to find the pressure, too. You can’t go away from it. We had a meeting today. We’re going to find that pressure. You can always get some good stuff out of it if you go find it. If you go away from it, it’s a long night.”
Tyler Myers on lessons learned from blown leads against Calgary: “I don’t think you flush it. You take a look at a lot of things you want to get better at. It was a good lesson for us for the first game. I thought we came out strong and then we got pretty loose the rest of the game. We thought it was going to be easy and we let them back into it. We want to start creating more consistency within our habits and details and come out harder.”
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