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Columnist: Flyers loss Friday might spark coaching change

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James

A month ago, Flyers president Peter Luukko said GM Paul Holmgren and coach Peter Laviolette’s jobs weren’t in jeopardy. However, it wouldn’t be surprising if Laviolette’s place with the team is being re-evaluated given Philadelphia’s continued woes.

Yesterday’s game against the New Jersey Devils was seen as a critical contest and they lost. Badly.

Flyers goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov said that the team would be “done” if they lost on Wednesday and Friday to New Jersey in both halves of their home-and-home series and while that’s an overstatement, their situation is certainly dire.

That being said, there have been hints that if the Flyers do lose on Friday, coach Peter Laviolette will be done, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

“Lavy’s emotional, he’s intense, he thinks the game really well,” Flyers forward Scott Hartnell said. “His bench awareness is great; it’s definitely not his fault.”

Having the vocal support of his players is great, but when teams fail to live up to expectations for long enough, changes come. It might take time, but as we’ve recently seen with Lindy Ruff, no one is completely immune.

Even still, Laviolette has led the Flyers to the playoffs in each of his first three seasons with the club and if it wasn’t for the fact that this was a shortened season, the Flyers’ 12-15-1 record wouldn’t be under quite as much scrutiny. Of course, that’s an academic point as the reality is that Philadelphia only has 20 games left to right its ship.

Related: Flyers insist coach Laviolette doesn’t deserve blame