Talk about a month of Crazy Eights.
After enduring an 8-game winless streak that saw the Flyers go 0-6-2, the Orange and Black can complete the turnaround by winning their eighth straight game tonight on home ice.
The Flyers (23-23-6, 52 points) welcome the Canucks (24-22-6, 54 points) to the Wells Fargo Center for their only matchup in Philadelphia.
Let's take a look at tonight's essentials.
• When: 7 p.m. ET
• Where: Wells Fargo Center
• Broadcast: NBCSP
• Live stream: NBCSportsPhiladelphia.com and the NBC Sports MyTeams app
With a victory tonight, the Flyers will record the 2,000th win in franchise history, becoming the first expansion to reach that milestone.
• The Flyers' previous meeting with the Canucks on Dec. 15 may have been their lowest point of the season as they dropped their fourth straight game on a five-game road trip while Anthony Stolarz suffered a lower-body injury and missed the next five weeks. It was also the final game Dave Hakstol coached as he was relieved of his duties two days later.
Philadelphia Flyers
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• The Canucks, who currently own the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference, have won three of their last four games with points in six of seven (4-1-2) following a convincing 5-1 win over the Avalanche on Saturday, which was the first game in their current four-game road trip.
• Vancouver has a winning record against every other division outside of the Metropolitan, where they're 3-7-0.
• Following Saturday's win over the Oilers, the Flyers finally clawed their way back to the .500 mark for the first time since beating the Buffalo Sabres 6-2 on Dec. 8 with a 12-12-3 record. The last time they were a game above .500 was back on Nov. 13 with a mark of 9-8-1.
• Head coach Scott Gordon laid out his goaltending plans for the next two games as he'll start Carter Hart for tonight's game against the Canucks and follow that up with Stolarz on Thursday against the Kings.
Hart is 6-0-0 with 2.63 GAA and a .926 save percentage. He can match Carey Price's rookie mark of seven straight wins before the age of 21 set back in his rookie season with Montreal in 2008.
• Right now, Canucks forward Elias Patterson is considered the favorite for the Calder Trophy as the league's top rookie as the Canucks' second line center leads the team with 23 goals and 46 points. Petterson is 18 points better than the next top rookie, Buffalo's Rasmus Dahlin.
• Amazingly, the Flyers' power play has found its groove over the past two games, going 6 for 7 in victories against the Bruins and the Oilers.
That hot stretch has seen the Flyers' PP go from 31st (last) in the league to 23rd overall at 16.2 percent.
• Captain Claude Giroux will move into third place on the franchise's all-time games played list at 791, passing Brian Propp (1979-90). Giroux has appeared in all but 15 of the 803 games the Flyers have played since joining the team in December 2008.
• Shayne Gostisbehere was a surprise return Saturday against the Oilers as coach Scott Gordon wasn't expecting the Flyers' defenseman to be in the lineup. Ghost responded with a power play assist playing on the top unit along with 21:27 of ice time.
Projected lineup
Forwards
James van Riemsdyk - Claude Giroux - Travis Konecny
Oskar Lindblom - Sean Couturier - Jake Voracek
Scott Laughton - Nolan Patrick - Wayne Simmonds
Michael Raffl - Mikhail Vorobyev - Phil Varone
Defensemen
Ivan Provorov - Travis Sanheim
Andrew MacDonald - Shayne Gostisbehere
Robert Hägg - Radko Gudas
Goalies
Carter Hart
Anthony Stolarz
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