{"id":606832,"date":"2026-04-14T19:11:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T19:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/606832\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T19:11:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T19:11:08","slug":"flyers-recall-oliver-bonk-four-others-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/606832\/","title":{"rendered":"Flyers Recall Oliver Bonk, Four Others \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Flyers will be resting some talent for tonight\u2019s season finale against the Canadiens after locking up a playoff berth with last night\u2019s win. As such, they announced<\/a> they\u2019ve called up several reinforcements from AHL Lehigh Valley \u2013 including 2023 first-round pick\u00a0Oliver Bonk<\/a>, who will be making his NHL debut tonight. Joining the hard-nosed defender are forwards\u00a0Jacob Gaucher<\/a> and\u00a0Anthony Richard<\/a>, defenseman\u00a0Hunter McDonald<\/a> and goaltender Aleksei Kolosov<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Philly likely hoped to get Bonk a look earlier in the season. The 22nd overall pick saw some notable offensive regression in his final season of junior hockey last year but otherwise capped up a successful pre-pro career with a second straight showing for Canada at the World Juniors and a Memorial Cup win with the London Knights. However, he sustained an upper-body injury shortly before training camp that ended up keeping him sidelined until Christmas.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s spent the months since getting used to the pro speed in the AHL. Early returns suggest Bonk may end up topping out as a higher-end second or third-pairing shutdown threat, not the top-pair complement they hoped he\u2019d be. The 21-year-old righty has managed a 6-13\u201319 scoring line with a -10 rating through 44 games with Lehigh Valley, which currently sits two points out of the Calder Cup Playoff picture with three games remaining.<\/p>\n

Still, he sits as the Flyers\u2019 #3-ranked prospect and the second-highest name that\u2019s currently playing in North America behind only budding star\u00a0Porter Martone<\/a>, who has eight points through his first eight games since turning pro out of Michigan State at the end of last month, per Scott Wheeler of Athletic<\/a>. Still, his assessment is that of a #4-5 man on Philly\u2019s depth chart long-term.<\/p>\n

Everyone else joining the team today does so with NHL experience, save for McDonald. Gaucher, an undrafted free agent who\u2019s worked his way up from being an ECHL mainstay just two years ago, is a pending restricted free agent, so tonight\u2019s game could double as a sort of audition for a qualifying offer in June. The 6\u20193\u2033, 185-lb center has been a 20-goal man in the AHL in back-to-back years now, but doesn\u2019t have a ton of growth left in his game at age 25. Through seven career NHL outings over the last two seasons, he\u2019s gone pointless with a -1 rating while averaging 7:57 of ice time per game.<\/p>\n

Richard is also a pending free agent of the unrestricted variety, but it wouldn\u2019t be surprising in the slightest to see the Flyers extend or retain him. The 29-year-old was an efficient call-up option last year, although he\u2019s yet to see NHL time this season. The former Predators fourth-rounder is now with his fourth NHL organization after making one-year stops with the Canadiens and Bruins in 2022-23 and 2023-24, respectively. He\u2019s been good for six goals and 14 points in 39 career NHL games in parts of five seasons. This year, he\u2019s Lehigh Valley\u2019s second-leading scorer with 18 goals and 44 points in 63 games.<\/p>\n

McDonald, 23, was rostered for a few games back in January while\u00a0Rasmus Ristolainen<\/a>\u00a0was sidelined but didn\u2019t end up seeing any action. That should change tonight. The 6\u20194\u2033, 238-lb lefty was a sixth-round pick in 2022 out of the USHL\u2019s Chicago Steel. He proceeded to have a standout freshman season at Northeastern the following year that got him named to Hockey East\u2019s All-Rookie Team while taking home Best Defensive Defenseman honors.<\/p>\n

The New York native signed his entry-level contract, which expires this summer, back in 2024. Over parts of three seasons now in Lehigh Valley, he\u2019s been a pure shutdown threat but a strong one. In 144 career outings, he\u2019s amassed four goals and 27 points with 199 penalty minutes and a +22 rating. He\u2019s much closer to being NHL-ready than his point production indicates and could very easily work his way into the conversation for a roster spot next fall.<\/p>\n

Kolosov, after years of drama regarding whether he\u2019d accept a consistent AHL assignment, has now firmly entrenched himself as the Flyers\u2019 #3 netminder. Whether the Flyers will tender him a qualifying offer \u2013 or whether Kolosov will sign it \u2013 this summer is a different story. His numbers aren\u2019t good. He hasn\u2019t posted a save percentage above .900 at any level since arriving in North America in 2024, with a career .863 mark and a 3.64 GAA in 21 career NHL outings with a 5-11-1 record. As Lehigh Valley\u2019s starter this season, he\u2019s amassed a .898 SV%, 2.88 GAA, two shutouts, and a 15-20-2 record in 37 games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Flyers will be resting some talent for tonight\u2019s season finale against the Canadiens after locking up a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":606833,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[295274,295275,64,63,246543,295276,575,47575,3065,85,206],"class_list":{"0":"post-606832","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-aleksei-kolosov","9":"tag-anthony-richard","10":"tag-au","11":"tag-australia","12":"tag-hunter-mcdonald","13":"tag-jacob-gaucher","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-oliver-bonk","16":"tag-philadelphia-flyers","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-transactions"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606832","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=606832"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606832\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/606833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=606832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=606832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=606832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}