The Philadelphia Flyers have activated forward Nicolas Deslauriers off the injured reserve and he is playing tonight against Utah. His return comes just as the Flyers lost Owen Tippett to an upper-body injury, which is good timing given their lack of forward options at the moment. The Flyers are still waiting for the debuts of recently acquired forwards Andrei Kuzmenko and Jakob Pelletier who continue to wait for their visa situation to be sorted out. Deslauriers will slide in on the wing on the fourth line alongside Rodrigo Abols and Jacob Gaucher.
The 33-year-old Deslauriers hasn’t played since November 9th because of an upper-body injury and should give the Flyers some sandpaper in their bottom six. The 12-year NHL veteran has been used sparingly this season when he has been healthy, averaging just 6:05 of ice time per game, a drop of well over four minutes a game from his career average.
Last year, the Flyers were a significantly worse team with the veteran in the lineup as Deslauriers only had four points in 60 games and posted a CF% of 45.7% at even strength. His advanced stats were even worse than that as the Flyers expected goals percentage (xGF%) was significantly higher with Deslauriers off the ice (53.4%) than when he was on it (44.0%).
This season, Deslauriers has played just seven games and has a single assist along with 15 hits and a blocked shot. His underlying numbers are much better this year (CF% of 58.9%), albeit in a small sample size. Prior to his injury, Deslauriers had served as a healthy scratch on several occasions, and that will likely remain the case if the Flyers get their full slate of forwards back in the coming weeks.
Oh joy.