Ryan Poehling ‘forever grateful’ for his two years with the Flyers

ANAHEIM, Calif. ― Ryan Poehling was on his option to the physician after coming house sick from a visit with one among his buddies when he noticed Danny Briere‘s quantity pop up on his cellphone final June.

“I’m like, ‘Oh boy,’” Poehling recalled on Wednesday. “So I just answered, and I was like, ‘Where am I going?’ And [Brière] laughed. At that moment, you’re freaking out, you don’t really know where, and when he said Anaheim, I was fired up.”

After two years with the Flyers, Poehling was traded to the Ducks with a 2025 second-round choose and a 2026 fourth-round choose for Trevor Zegras on June 23. Poehling will tackle his former teammates for the second time on Wednesday (10 p.m., NBCSP).

» READ MORE: Trevor Zegras returns to Anaheim for the first time at the top of his game. Now, can I master playing center?

The centerman has fit in nicely for the Pacific Division-leading Ducks with eight goals and 29 points in 60 games. Since the Olympic break, he’s been on a tear and is tied for fifth on the Ducks in points with three goals and seven points in 11 games. Dating back to Jan. 19, he’s fourth with 14 points in 19 games.

“Was I surprised? [More like] I’m definitely pleased,” Ducks coach Joel Quenneville said. “I’ve seen him do some good things. “I think there’s more consistency to his game, but we rely on him.”

“Poehls has had a really good year for us,” added Quenneville, who is in his first year with Anaheim. “I think he had an ordinary start… but as the season’s gone on here, the more he’s played, the better he’s played…. He’s added to our special teams, possession game, defensively he’s been reliable, but his speed is the part that he’s really added a nice dimension to our team.”

The Flyers’ best bottom-six pivot the last few years, Poehling brought speed, scoring ability, and defensive prowess after signing a bet-on-himself, one-year deal with the Flyers in the summer of 2023. He earned himself a two-year extension in January 2024 and posted career highs in goals (12), assists (19), and points (31) last season.

The 27-year-old has taken that same skill set of being a smart, two-way center to the Ducks, where he ranks second on the team with three shorthanded points (one goal, two assists) and is first among forwards in average ice time on the penalty kill.

On March 5, Poehling signed a four-year, $15 million extension with the Ducks. A little bit of a journeyman earlier than touchdown in Philly, he’s appreciative of the Flyers giving him an opportunity and serving to him discover consistency at the NHL degree.

“So a lot. Honestly, it is not even simply an opportunity. The guys, and the folks, the group, I’m simply ceaselessly grateful for them. They actually made me fall in love with hockey once more,” said Poehling, who is enjoying the weather in California and had dinner with some of his former Flyers teammates this week.

“My time in the professional league was simply so up and down; I used to be enjoying good after which not enjoying good, or this and that, and simply consistently, your head’s all type of whacked out.

“So going to Philly made me fall in love with the game and just enjoy being around the rink with the guys and being able to play the game you love and play well, I owe them so much.”

His time in Philly additionally taught him about Public Enemy No. 1: former Flyers draft choose Cutter Gauthier. The humorous factor is, the two at the moment are linemates.

“When I was in Philly, I told Cutter, we all hated you,” Poehling mentioned with amusing. “That’s how it was. And now, getting to know the guy… he’s a great hockey player, but he’s a better human, and I enjoy playing with him.”

» READ MORE: The Flyers’ power play is last in the NHL again. Here are three suggestions for how they can fix it.

Tim Washe on Alex Bump

Alex Bump is beginning to open eyes in Philly and throughout the NHL for his puck possession and goal-scoring prowess. Ducks ahead Tim Washe has lengthy identified what the winger can do.

“I consider him the best player I’ve played with at school,” Washe mentioned. “I was there for five years, and what he did his first two years is so hard to do, especially in college and [in] our conference as well. He’s just so impressive, what he can do on the ice.

The forwards were teammates for two seasons at Western Michigan. In his first collegiate season, Bump was named to the National Collegiate Hockey Conference’s All-Rookie Team and was a finalist for the NCHC Rookie of the Year Award after tallying 36 points (14 goals and 22 assists) in 38 games.

Last season, donning an “A,” Bump leveled as much as 23 objectives and 47 factors in 42 video games as the Broncos received the program’s first NCAA males’s championship.

“The puck’s always finding him. It’s always on a stick,” mentioned Washe, who was Western Michigan’s captain final season. “He’s able to shield defenders off, and he’s got a big frame. He just makes a lot of great plays with the puck.

“[At] the Frozen Four, all the other teams are focused on him, and that takes pressure off other guys. So he was always playing against the other team’s best players, and he always handled it really well.”

Washe always knew that Bump, who was a fifth-round pick by the Flyers in 2022, would make the NHL. He’s kept an eye on the winger’s first five NHL games — in which he has two goals, an assist, 13 shot attempts, and seven scoring chances — and knows it will be a tough night against his ex-teammate.

» READ MORE: Alex Bump’s inner circle and inner belief have fueled his fast rise with the Flyers

“He likes to shoot. He’s received an awesome shot. Playing in opposition to that, you wish to get in lanes and be on him early, proper? So we won’t get these off, however enjoying with him, you simply attempt to discover him.

“He can play in all areas of the ice, and he’s able to get the puck for himself, too, if he’s not getting it, but he just finds ways to get in the right areas and get those shots.”

Breakaways

According to a workforce supply, Owen McLaughlin, a Flyers seventh-round choose in 2021, has signed a deal with Lehigh Valley of the American Hockey League. McLaughlin, who hails from Spring City, Chester Countylists Brière as one among his favourite gamers rising up and spent his childhood skating at Oaks Center Ice and West Chester‘s Ice Line. A North Dakota switch, he simply wrapped up his senior 12 months at Boston University with 5 objectives and 17 factors in 34 video games whereas splitting time between heart and wing.