Matvei Michkov took his first shift Thursday night against St. Louis and didn't see another at even strength until late in the first period.
With Nick Seeler trying to clear the puck out of the Flyers' own zone, the 19-year old Michkov kicked it and lost control of it at the blue line, which led straight to a Brandon Saad scoring chance. Then, when the puck came wrapping back to Michkov along the wall, he flubbed the chip out, and with some passive checking to follow up, Jordan Kyrou stickhandled straight to the Flyers' net, though luckily for them, without much of an angle to get a good shot off.
When Michkov returned to the bench, there he stayed outside of an early run on the power play that didn't amount to anything for the Flyers. He missed three even strength shifts in total and didn't get back on his line with Sean Couturier and Travis Konecny until there was 5:54 left in the frame for an offensive zone draw.
It was a rough, and relatively quiet night overall for the Flyers' headlining rookie. He only had a single shot registered in Thursday night's grind of a 2-1 win over the Blues at the Wells Fargo Center, and had just 13:56 of ice time, his lowest of the season so far.
It was the first time head coach John Tortorella sat him down and one of the early of likely many more tough lessons to learn about the NHL for the teenager the Flyers are hoping will soon enough be their next major star.
But Tortorella was ready for this. The Flyers, as an organization, expected this. It's just part of the process for such a young player.
"He's a 19-year old kid playing in the best league in the world," Tortorella said postgame. "I think he's beginning to see what the National Hockey League is, as far as the speed, as far as time and space, all the things that come with it.
"There are going to be some major struggles with him 5-on-5. We expect that. Where I'm going to have to teach, and in that teaching moment – I'm not going to tell you what it's all about – but if we keep on seeing the same mistake, and it just totally is not concentrating on a certain part of the game, that's when – and I've been very honest with him about that – he's going to miss some ice. He's gonna watch the game. It's not me screaming at him. It's telling him 'This is how it works, and if I think other guys are going and you're struggling in certain situations, and it's repetitive, you're gonna have to sit and watch for a little bit.' That's all that was."
Michkov's offensive skill was never in doubt from the second it was confirmed that he was coming over from Russia ahead of schedule, and it only became all that more promising once everyone got to actually see him operate up close in camp, the preseason, and then on into the early part of the regular season.
Through the Flyers' first 11 games, Michkov has four goals and five assists for nine points, with six of those points coming on the power play for a team that has been suffering in that aspect of the game for a long time now.
The young winger, however, is also minus-5, partially because the Flyers, up until the past two games, have been a bit of a mess structurally and partially because of the work Michkov still needs to do on the defensive part of his game in adjusting to an entirely new league.
The former, the Flyers are getting there. They're checking hard again and stepping in front of every shot they can to have themselves with two wins in a row for the first time this season and victories in three of their last four, hoping a bit more offense comes in time.
The latter, again, the organization expected this.
"He's had some struggles," Tortorella continued about Michkov. "He doesn't play four games in six nights over there [in Russia]. He doesn't play against competition like he plays here. So there are gonna be some major struggles within his 5-on-5 game.
"The power play, I feel very comfortable. He's gonna do some things there, so I'm going to have to watch him, and just like any other young player, or really any other player in that room, he's going to be held accountable as we go through these games, and we'll see where it goes."
Obviously, Michkov came in as the Flyers prospect with, by far, the most hype behind him – the seventh overall draft pick from 2023 with the skill and potential to be a game-changing superstar. But he's hardly the first young player Tortorella has benched, and almost assuredly won't be the last.
Morgan Frost, Bobby Brink, Joel Farabee, and Egor Zamula, for example, have all been there, either via benchings or full-on scratchings. The key, however, is that they usually all come back from that downtime as better players in some aspect of their game.
And it isn't lost on anyone within the Flyers: Michkov wants to be great. He wants to be better.
The process of getting there is just going to be rough at times. Thursday night was one of the first instances.
"He's a great kid," Tortorella said. "He wants to do so well, but it's a lot. It's a lot for him. That line [of Michkov, Couturier, and Konecny] – the power play's been good, I think it's struggled a little bit over the past few games – but 5-on-5, that line really hasn't been that great, and he has struggled 5-on-5.
"But when it comes to situations that we've gone over and he still totally doesn't understand, some part of that for me was, I don't think he really understood, and we needed to get him in between periods. But I didn't want to sit him a period, I didn't. I just wanted him to sit, relax, think about what I said to him – I think he missed two or three rotations and we put him back out there. That's the way it's going to be.
"He may miss games. Who knows? I don't know what's gonna happen, but that's part of the development of a 19-year old kid."
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