Flyers, Still Lacking Juice, Lose 5th Straight in Michael Bunting's Debut

Although they played their best game of the season overall, the Philadelphia Flyers' best still wasn't good enough, losing 2-1 to the Ottawa Senators at Canadian Tire Centre on Thursday night and dropping their fifth straight game.

Now 0-3-2, the Flyers will face the Boston Bruins in Boston on Saturday afternoon, and if they can't win that one, they will return home Sunday still winless. And on Sunday, they host Carolina... again.

The schedule isn't getting any easier for the juiceless Flyers, who were shut out at 5-on-5 for the second time already this season. In five games, the Flyers have scored just four times at 5-on-5, and the five teams tied with them (Calgary, New Jersey, Los Angeles, Anaheim, and Columbus) have all played four games or fewer.

Nick Cousins got the Senators on the board following the expiry of an Ottawa power play, deflecting a Tyler Kleven shot past Joseph Woll after beating Cam York to the front of the net. Despite the fortunate bounce, the Flyers actually out-shot the Senators 11-8 in the opening frame.

The Flyers repeated the feat in the second period, out-shooting their opponents 11-9 with Matvei Michkov tucking in a loose Trevor Zegras rebound on the power play to tie the game at 1-1.

In the third period, the Senators punched back with a 9-7 shots advantage, which is generous to the Flyers, who generated the bulk of their offense trying to tie the game in the dying few minutes.

Carter Yakemchuk scored the game-winning goal for the Senators in a dark twist of irony, as Michael Bunting, the player signed to give the Flyers a spark, took the penalty that gave the Senators their fifth power play opportunity of the night, and one they didn't squander, in his first game action of the season.

So, while the Flyers finally didn't get crushed by their opponents in the run of play, it shouldn't be celebrated as progress or a building block. That's the expectation every night for all 84 games.

That's how the Flyers got in this mess, with conversations about "compete" and complacency a week into the 2026-27 campaign.

Stats dump and line changes

I was a bit surprised to see David Jiricek move up to the second pairing next to York after his high-profile backbreaker against Tampa Bay on Monday night, but he handled the added responsibility, including time on PP1, very well.

Jiricek recorded two shots on goal and played 18:25 (third to only Travis Sanheim and Jamie Drysdale). According to Natural Stat Trick, the Flyers out-shot the Senators with Jiricek on the ice at 5-on-5 in terms of attempts, unblocked attempts, and shots on goal, though scoring chances were 6-5 in Ottawa's favor.

With York on the ice at 5-on-5, though, scoring chances were 10-3 in Ottawa's favor. The 25-year-old's uncharacteristically poor play at both ends of the ice has dragged down his defense partners early on this season.

Matvei Michkov took over as the de facto center on PP1, winning four of seven faceoffs (57.1%) in place of Trevor Zegras.

There was once a time in the not-so-distant past that the Flyers refused to have the two on the same power play, and now Michkov has wrested another job from Zegras just five games into the season.

Tyson Foerster has just two goals, his only two points, in his last 15 games, including the playoffs. He is a -8 in that span.

Porter Martone has been held off the scoresheet through his first five games this season, though it's worth noting he's averaging just 12:55 of ice time a game.

Comparatively, Martone averaged 17:02 in his nine regular season games with the Flyers at the end of last season, and 16:48 in the playoffs.