{"id":819307,"date":"2026-08-20T00:18:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-20T00:18:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/819307\/"},"modified":"2026-08-20T00:18:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T00:18:09","slug":"flyers-hungry-to-take-next-step-after-ending-playoff-drought-drysdale-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/819307\/","title":{"rendered":"Flyers \u2018hungry\u2019 to take next step after ending playoff drought, Drysdale says"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Flyers, who open the season at home against the Penguins on Sept. 30 (7:30 p.m. ET; TNT), are laden with young talent. Leading the way is forward Porter Martone<\/a>, the No. 6 pick in the 2025 NHL Draft, who joined the team late in the season after finishing his freshman campaign with Michigan State University.<\/p>\n

Martone, who will turn 20 on Oct. 26, made an immediate impact with 10 points (four goals, six assists) in nine regular-season games and five points (two goals, three assists) in 10 playoff games. Forwards Denver Barkey<\/a>, 21, (43 games) and Alex Bump<\/a>, 22, (17 games) each made his NHL debut last season while forward Matvei Michkov<\/a>\u00a021, is entering the final season of his three-year, entry level contract. All three hold high expectations.<\/p>\n

Drysdale said he is demanding more of himself as he begins his third full season with the Flyers. He has 102 points (25 goals, 77 assists) through 295 career games and the security of a four-year, $26 million contract ($6.5 million AAV) signed on July 17 eliminated any doubts about his future. While the No. 6 pick in the 2020 NHL Draft battled injuries early in his career, back-to-back seasons of at least 70 games played have left him confident he can elevate his game.<\/p>\n

\u201cHad the injury bug for a little bit there, but I\u2019m feeling great,\u201d Drysdale said. \u201cThe first year in Philadelphia was just honestly stay healthy and play as many games as you can and last year was like, all right, I\u2019ve been around here long enough and it\u2019s time to go and show what I can do. I had a good year, not great, but I still think there\u2019s a lot I can show, a lot I can do, so I feel really good going into this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust participate a lot more across the board. Offensively make more plays. Play with more confidence, keep growing that and make more and more of an impact night in and night out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Flyers, who open the season at home against the Penguins on Sept. 30 (7:30 p.m. ET; TNT),…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":819308,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-819307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/819307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=819307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/819307\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/819308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=819307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=819307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=819307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}