Ted Lasso lessons to live by for the fading Flyers as their playoff hopes hang in the balance

COLUMBUS, Ohio ― After the Flyers’ 6-2 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday night, Scott Laughton was asked what he thinks it will take for the group to find that next gear.

“Belief. Believing in the guy next to you,” he said.

Belief is critical, especially at this time of year. The Flyers have just four games remaining in the regular season and are now out of the playoff bubble. But they can get back into the top eight if they can find that next gear, which they had for big chunks of the season and put them in the Stanley Cup playoff picture to begin with.

As famed AFC Richmond coach Ted Lasso said, “I believe in hope. I believe in believe.”

Maybe that’s just what this Flyers team needs. Not just a sheet of yellow paper with “Believe” written on it but the belief that they can be that team again. Because if they don’t, the season will be over in nine days.

Here are three more lessons the Flyers can believe in from the television show Ted Lasso after extending their losing streak to seven games.

The purest lesson from the show may be what the Flyers need right now.

According to the football-turned-soccer coach, goldfish have a 10-second memory. With time ticking on the season, Philly must put this one behind them. Fast. As coach John Tortorella said, “We just can’t do anything about this game, so we get ready for our next one.”

The next one is a rematch with the Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday; 10 days ago they topped the Flyers 4-1. That one should be an afterthought already. But before they can seek revenge, they have to be goldfish and forget how they once again came out slow against the Blue Jackets. They must leave behind the power play faltering — again — despite having a four-minute man advantage early on. They need to remove the memory of leaving lanes wide open for the Blue Jackets, allowing them to set up goals, especially a pair of one-timers by Damon Severson from the top and the bottom of the left circle.

» READ MORE: Noah Cates finding his game at the right time as the Flyers make final push for playoffs

And they need to be goldfish by putting all their struggles and all their inabilities to finish behind them.

“I think the teams you see do well are playing their best hockey right now. And they’re going to continue that until the playoffs. So that’s what we need to do. We need to play our best hockey and we can’t think about what happened. Can’t look back, can’t change anything,” Garnet Hathaway said. “So we’ve got to keep going.”

Laughton said it best: The Flyers need to get back to playing aggressively.

When the Flyers were playing well — not necessarily winning but competing and playing at the top of their game like they did in a 6-5 overtime loss to the New York Rangers on March 26 — they were forechecking and playing with some bite.

Lately, there seems to be a lot of reaching or not taking one more step to get closer to the puck. The Flyers are struggling to connect on passes and separate opponents from the puck. And the hits are way down. Saturday night the Flyers were credited with eight; Hathaway and Tyson Foerster had two each. The Blue Jackets aren’t bangers — they had 10.

» READ MORE: Sielski: With Sam Ersson and Ivan Fedotov, the Flyers have some uncertainty in net. Feels like old times.

“I thought we made great strides [Friday],” Tortorella said, referencing a 4-2 loss to the Buffalo Sabres. “[Saturday] at times, just seemed we were a step behind. I’m not sure if that’s the back-to-back situation. But we had some chances. I think to get aggressive and have energy, you need something good to happen offensively.”

Good things happen by stepping up one’s game. Yes, the Flyers came close on Saturday; Bobby Brink hit the post on a backhander and Travis Konecny hit the pipe twice. Cam Atkinson was handed a pizza but lost the puck at the last second on a breakaway and Konecny missed an open net with a one-timer off a pass from Joel Farabee as they broke out three-on-one.

“We’ve done a lot of good things offensively, putting pressure on teams. The last two games I’d say we were surrounding the net. But we’re not getting that scoring touch. And that’s up and down throughout [the lineup] right now,” Hathaway said. “I think the way to get out of it is just keep going. Keep pushing through.”

One guy who has been working harder finally got lucky on Saturday. Olle Lycksell has been rewarded recently with more ice time — he’s averaging more than 11 minutes in the last two games — and elevation onto the third line alongside Ryan Poehling and Hathaway. After notching four shots on goal Friday night, he needed just one to score his first NHL goal off a pretty back-door feed from Hathaway.

“That was a big goal for us,” Hathaway said about Lycksell’s goal that cut the Blue Jackets’ lead to 3-1. “That’s his game. He’s a hard-nosed kid that’s fast and he gets to the net. He has that scoring touch ... so it was nice to see him score that.”

“Taking on a challenge is a lot like riding a horse, isn’t it?” Lasso once asked before answering himself: “If you’re comfortable while you’re doing it, you’re probably doing it wrong.”

Are the Flyers comfortable right now? Hard to gauge as they continue to struggle to get out of their current funk. But if they want to get out of it and officially take on the challenge — a postseason push — they need to get uncomfortable quick.

“It falls on some of our older guys and especially me,” Laughton said, shouldering the losing streak. “Gotta get this group ready and ready to go. It’s not good enough.”

The Flyers have four games left: in Montreal on Tuesday; at the Rangers on Thursday; home on Saturday against the New Jersey Devils; and the season finale at the Wells Fargo Center on April 16 against the Washington Capitals.

Washington is one point back of the Flyers with two games in hand, one of which will be made up on Sunday against the Ottawa Senators. The New York Islanders sit in third place in the Metropolitan Division, with a game in hand. They are two points ahead of the Flyers but have a tough schedule with two games against the Rangers on the horizon before a season-ender against the Penguins, who are the second wild card. Although the Flyers are tied in points with them, Pittsburgh has played one fewer game but also holds the first two tiebreakers (regulation wins, and regulation and overtime wins.

“I don’t think a lot of people [are] playing their best hockey. I think there’s some guys that have found their way a little bit [and] other guys are pressing,” Tortorella said. “But it’s a loss. It’s an ugly one. But we can’t get discouraged. No one’s going to help us out of this and being discouraged isn’t going to help it. We’ve just got to try to stay positive.”

» READ MORE: ‘Nothing short of spectacular’: Sean Couturier named Flyers’ Masterton Trophy nominee