Desperate for something positive, the Flyers visit the red-hot Penguins as Wade Allison makes NHL debut

The Flyers and Penguins, bitter rivals that meet Thursday in Pittsburgh, are trending in opposite directions.

Up: That’s the Penguins, who are on a 15-4-1 run and are within four points of first-place Washington in the East Division and have a game in hand on the Capitals. They trail the second-place New York Islanders by two points.

Down: That’s the Flyers, who have lost four of their last five and are 8-13-3 since the start of March. They are in sixth place in the East, six points behind fourth-place Boston for the final playoff spot. The Bruins have two games in hand.

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Carter Hart will start for the Flyers and will try to end a personal seven-game losing streak. Hart has won 8 of 24 decisions (8-11-5) and has a 3.80 GAA and .872 save percentage.

The 22-year-old goaltender is 2-1 with a 3.34 GAA and .894 save percentage against the Penguins this season.

The Flyers have averaged just 2.2 goals over their last 14 games, and several players are in long scoring droughts, including Scott Laughton (goalless in his last 18 games) and James van Riemsdyk (goalless in last 16 games).

The Flyers’ top offensive threat lately has been defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere, who has three goals and four assists over his last five games.

Jake Guentzel has been sizzling for the Penguins, collecting five goals and 10 points over his last five games. He leads Pittsburgh with 20 goals, the fourth straight year he has reached that level. Guentzel, Leon Draisaitl, Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews, and Alex Ovechkin are the only NHL players who have recorded four 20-goal seasons since the beginning of the 2017-18 campaign.

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The Penguins will use Tristan Jarry (17-8-2) in the nets. He has a 2.84 GAA and .907 save percentage.

The Flyers have allowed the first goal in 10 of the last 12 games. They are 3-2 against the Penguins this year — they swept the Penguins at the Wells Fargo Center in the season’s first two games, winning 6-3 and 5-2, with Hart stopping 31 shots in each victory. Joel Farabee had four points in the first win, and Travis Konecny had his first career hat trick in the latter victory. Konecny has nine points in five games against the Pens this season.

Pittsburgh then won twice in a three-game series at PPG Paints Arena in early March, sandwiching 5-2 and 4-3 victories around a 4-3 loss to the Flyers.

In the Flyers’ lone win in Pittsburgh, they overcame an early 3-0 deficit as Claude Giroux had three points and tallied the game-winner with 2:08 left in regulation.

Right winger Wade Allison, 23, will make his NHL debut tonight for the Flyers.

Selected in the second round of the 2016 draft, the 6-2, 205-pound Allison had nine points in eight games with the AHL’s Phantoms this season. He had an outstanding career at Western Michigan University, and is No. 3 in The Inquirer’s rankings of Flyers prospects. Morgan Frost is No. 1, and York is No. 2.

Former Flyer Jeff Carter will make his Pittsburgh debut. … Evgeni Malkin is still sidelined for the Pens with a lower-body injury. … Defenseman Mark Freidman, a former Flyer, has missed the last 20 games with an injury. … The Flyers are 3-10 in their last 13 games against a team with a winning record. … Since the beginning of March, the Flyers have faced multiple-goal deficits in 17 of 24 games. … In 73 career games against the Flyers, Sidney Crosby has a staggering 108 points (45 goals, 63 assists). That’s 1.48 points per game. … Giroux has 57 points (18-39) in 56 career games against the Pens. … The Flyers and Penguins have three more meetings this season. … Crosby has four goals and 12 assists over the last 10 games. … Pittsburgh has scored four or more goals in its last six games. … Sean Couturier has six goals and five assists in his last 11 games; his six goals have come on 31 shots, a 19.4 shooting percentage.