Early injury concerns for Flyers ahead of opening night

The Flyers have an advantage that a lot of teams around the league do not have. They will not open their season until Friday, after 16 NHL games will have already taken place. Six of them will feature other teams from the Metropolitan Division. In fact, Philadelphia will be among the last teams from said division to play their first game as the Devils open their season Friday as well.

Fresh with plenty of new acquisitions, the Flyers will boast a lineup that features eight players who did not put on the orange and black last season. Or will they?

There is some cause for concern when it comes to two of the Flyers’ newest defensemen. Ryan Ellis and Rasmus Ristolainen have missed the last three practice and were deemed to be taking maintenance days on all three of them. With two other days off between all three practices, there is some concern on what the two players are dealing with.

"“Both, exactly like I said the other day, it’s still maintenance. When discussing this with the training staff, we’ve got a couple of extra days here. So we’re being very cautious. We’ve given them the extra day to heal those bumps and bruises. Expect them both to be back on the ice Thursday when we skate.”"

Alain Vigneault later went on to say that Ellis is dealing with a lower body injury and Ristolainen is dealing with an upper body injury. No other word on what those exact injuries were, however. The Flyers will have a skate on Thursday, morning skate Friday and possibly even warmups to determine if both will be able to go.

Ristolainen took the ice along with Kevin Hayes and skills coach Angelo Ricco for some work before the team’s practice on Tuesday afternoon. Ellis was not seen and has not skated at all since Friday’s preseason finale.

Ellis was brought in to assume top pairing duties with Ivan Provorov while Ristolainen would take the second pairing with Travis Sanheim. Both players are important to the team’s defensive core and would certainly be missed if they couldn’t take the ice on Friday evening.

"“They’re definitely huge. They’re two of our big acquisitions this off-season on defense. I don’t know if they’ll be in or out for game one. But we’re excited to have them with us as soon as possible.” Sean Couturier said after Tuesday’s practice.“Just seeing them, how they fit into the team so far. And seeing how they’ve been on the ice, on and off the ice I should say. They’ve been good additions for us and again you can see they’re gonna be big elements to our team. So we hope to have them in the lineup.” James van Riemsdyk said when asked about Ellis and Ristolainen."

The two will be very important pieces to the Flyers’ defensive core and their potential absence could cause some early trouble. Add in the fact that the team only has about 40K in cap space and things could get really interesting on Friday night.