Flyers place center Ryan Poehling on injured reserve, recall Anthony Richard
Richard, who impressed in camp with his speed and goal-scoring ability, has played 24 NHL games over nine seasons.
TAMPA, Fla. — The struggling Flyers will have to try and right the ship without Ryan Poehling.
One day after coach John Tortorella revealed Poehling was not with the team and is “a little bit banged up” and also dealing with a family situation, the Flyers placed the center on injured reserve retroactive to Nov. 2. In a corresponding move, Anthony Richard has been called up from Lehigh Valley of the American Hockey League.
The third Flyer placed on IR in a season that isn’t even four weeks old, Poehling has five assists in 12 games and is one of two players with a positive plus-minus (plus-2); his frequent linemate Garnet Hathaway is plus-1.
» READ MORE: John Tortorella showed his frustration with his short postgame comments. But was it all bad vs. the Hurricanes?
Defenseman Cam York trmsind on IR with an upper-body injury and fellow blueliner Nick Seeler missed the start of the season with a nerve injury in his right leg and foot. Goalie Sam Ersson was injured on Saturday but has not been placed on IR and skated after the team’s optional morning skate on Tuesday.
Known for his speed, Poehling went end-to-end and split the defense Thursday against the St. Louis Blues to set up Hathaway for his first goal of the season. Poehling played in Saturday’s loss to the Boston Bruins, skating almost 12 minutes and winning four of six faceoffs. He also featured on the penalty kill and has become a key cog alongside Hathaway for the Flyers’ kill, the NHL’s third-best (88.9%).
Noah Cates, who had been on the wing with Poehling and Hathaway, centered the line on Tuesday in Raleigh, N.C.. Nick Deslauriers slotted into the lineup alongside them.
Whether Cates stays at center is to be determined. Richard, a center, was impressive in camp with his speed and had four points (two goals, two assists) in six preseason games. Signed to a two-year, two-way $1.55 million contract on July 2, he impressed Tortorella.
“Richard has had a good camp,” Tortorella said on Oct. 1. “He can skate. He has put up numbers down in the American [Hockey] League. He brings offense, has just played good.
“I remember I talked to him early on in camp, and I told him, I said, ‘I don’t care about turnovers. I want you to take a chance to try to bring some offense in a team that needs offense.’ And I think he’s done a pretty good job of that in camp. He has turned the puck over a few times, but we want to play with some risk and try to explain our philosophy to him, and so we continue to evaluate him and look at him.”
In seven games with the Phantoms, he has nine points (four goals, five assists) and is plus-3. His 19% shooting percentage, albeit at a lower level, would rank third on the Flyers behind York and winger Travis Konecny. Richard, who turns 28 next month, has four goals and four assists in 24 career NHL games with the Nashville Predators, Montreal Canadiens, and Bruins.