FLYERS FRANCHISE HISTORY

The city of Philadelphia had been home to an NHL team before The Philadelphia Flyers for one season; the Philadelphia Quakers during the 1930-31 NHL season. The Quakers set an NHL record for fewest wins and did not play a second season.  In 1966 the NHL expanded and awarded Philadelphia a new franchise.  Ed Snider chose the name "Flyers" based on a contest entry that spelled the name "Fliers."

1967-1972

Beginning play in 1967-68, the Philadelphia Flyers played their first game on October 11, 1967, in California, where they lost 5-1 to the California Seals.  The Flyers first win came a week later on the road in a 2-1 victory over the St. Louis Blues.  On October 19, in front of a home crowd of 7,812, The Flyers made their home debut and defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins in a 1-0 shutout.  After the expansion draft, the original Flyers team included star Goalie Bernie Parent, Team Captain Lou Angotti, future captain Ed Van Impe, Joe Watson, and Gary Dornhoefer who went on to offer color commentary in Flyers Broadcasts with Gene Hart and Jim Jackson providing play-by-play.  The Flyers were grouped in a division with the league's other five expansion teams and won their division despite tallying a sub-.500 record and having been forced to play their last 7 home games on the road because of storm damage to the Spectrum.

Lou Angotti left the team in the off-season and Ed Van Impe replaced him as team captain. The Flyers struggled during their sophomore season and finished 15 games under .500.  Despite their poor regular season showing in 1968-69, they made the playoffs coming out of the expansion division; however, they were manhandled by St. Louis in a four-game sweep. Not wanting his team to be physically outmatched again, owner Ed Snider instructed General Manager Bud Poile to acquire bigger, tougher players.

While head coach Keith Allen soon after replaced Poile as GM, this mandate would eventually lead to one of the most feared teams to ever take the ice in the NHL. The keystone of those teams was acquired when the Flyers took a chance on a 19-year-old diabetic from Flin Flon, Manitoba named Bobby Clarke with their second draft pick, 17th overall, in the 1969 NHL Amateur Draft. Keeping to Snider's mandate, the team also drafted future enforcer Dave Schultz 52nd overall.

Even as a rookie, Bobby Clarke was the best player on the team, and he quickly became a fan favorite. His 15 goals and 31 assists in his rookie season made him an NHL All-Star. Despite Clarke's arrival to the Flyers, the team struggled in 1969-70, recording only 17 wins--the fewest in franchise history (as of completion of the 2007-08 season). They lost a tiebreaker for the final playoff spot to Oakland, missing the playoffs for the first time. In 1970-71 the Flyers returned to the playoffs, but were swept by the Chicago Black Hawks in the first round. Even though the team had improved their record in his second season behind the bench, head coach Vic Stasiuk was replaced by Fred Shero in the off-season.

It was during the 1972-73 season that the Flyers shed the mediocre expansion team label and became the intimidating Broad Street Bullies, a nickname coined by Jack Chevalier and Pete Cafone of the Philadelphia Bulletin on January 3, 1973 due to the team's brawling ways.  That same month, Clarke was the youngest player in NHL history to be named team captain, replacing Ed Van Impe. Rick MacLeish became the first Flyer to score 50 goals in a season and the Flyers recorded their first winning season. An overtime goal by Gary Dornhoefer in Game 5 turned the tide of their first round series with the Minnesota North Stars in the Flyers' favor, as the Flyers got their first playoff series win in six games. They were outmatched in the semifinals by the Montreal Canadiens, however, losing in five games. After the season, Clarke was awarded the Hart Memorial Trophy as the NHL's Most Valuable Player.

Facing Buffalo in the Stanley Cup Finals, the Flyers won the first two games at home. Game 3, played in Buffalo, would go down in hockey lore as The Fog Game due to an unusual May heat wave in Buffalo which forced parts of the game to be played in heavy fog, as Buffalo's arena lacked air conditioning. The Flyers lost Games 3 and 4, but won Game 5 at home in dominating fashion, 5-1. On the road for Game 6, Bob Kelly scored the decisive goal and Parent pitched another shutout (a playoff record fifth shutout) as the Flyers repeated as Stanley Cup Champions. Parent also repeated as the playoff MVP, winning a second consecutive Conn Smythe Trophy.

The highlight of the 1975-76 season had no bearing on the season standings. On January 11 at the Spectrum, the Flyers, as part of the Super Series '76, played a memorable exhibition game against the Soviet Union's dominant Central Red Army team. As the Bullies had put intimidation to good use the past three years, the Flyers' rugged style of play led the Soviets to leave the ice midway through the first period, protesting a hit on Valeri Kharlamov, whom Clarke had slashed on the ankle in the famous Summit Series '72, by Ed Van Impe. After some delay, the Soviets returned after they were warned that they would lose their salary for the entire series. The Flyers went on to win the game rather easily, 4-1, and were the only team to defeat the Red Army outright in the series. Head coach Fred Shero would proclaim, "Yes we are world champions. If they had won, they would have been world champions. We beat the hell out of a machine."

The Flyers recorded the best record in team history (points wise) with a record of 51-13-16. The LCB line, featuring Reggie Leach at right-wing, Clarke at center, and Bill Barber at left-wing, set an NHL record for goals by a single line with 141 (Leach 61, Clarke 30, Barber 50). Clarke, on his way to a third Hart Trophy, set a club record for points in one season with 119. Heading into the playoffs, the Flyers squeaked past Toronto in seven games and defeated Boston in five games, Game 5 featuring a five-goal outburst by Leach, the Riverton Rifle, to head to a third straight appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals. However, the Flyers didn't come close to a third straight championship without an injured Bernie Parent, as they ran into an up-and-coming dynasty in Montreal, and were swept in four straight games. Despite the loss, Leach was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy for scoring a record 19 goals in 16 playoff games.

Mike Keenan, relatively unknown at the time, was hired in 1984 to coach the team, and named second-year player Dave Poulin as team captain. Behind the goaltending of Pelle Lindbergh (who led the league with 40 wins and won the Vezina Trophy), the Flyers won a franchise-record 53 games, the best in the league. The Flyers would roll through the playoffs by sweeping the Rangers in three games, defeating the Islanders in five, and beating Quebec in six to return to the Stanley Cup Finals. Though they defeated the defending Stanley Cup Champion Oilers in Game 1 by a score of 4-1 at home, Edmonton won the next four games and the series.

A month into the 1985-86 season, Pelle Lindbergh was killed in a car accident. The team rallied and showed perseverance by garnering the best record in the Wales Conference and matching their win total (53) from the previous year. Tim Kerr scored 58 goals and the defense pairing of Howe and Brad McCrimmon led the league in plus/minus, a +85 and a +83 respectively. Bob Froese filled in admirably in net for Pele Lindbergh, being named a 2nd Team All-Star and sharing the William M. Jennings Trophy with teammate Darren Jensen. Despite their regular season success, an emotionally exhausted Flyers team lost in the first round of the playoffs to a "Cinderella" Rangers team in five games.

In 1986 the rejuvenated Flyers found another Vezina Trophy goaltender between the pipes with a rookie named Ron Hextall from Brandon, Manitoba. He became the third Flyers goaltender to win the Vezina Trophy, joining Parent and Lindbergh. With Hextall providing critical stops at crucial times, the Flyers captured a third-straight Patrick Division title, and were able to gain revenge on the Rangers by beating them in six games, as well as surviving a tough seven-game test from a gritty Islanders club. By the time the Flyers defeated the defending Stanley Cup Champion Canadiens in six to win the Wales Conference and return to the Stanley Cup Finals, the Flyers had again been decimated by injuries, including losing Tim Kerr for the remainder of the playoffs. As a result, the Flyers lost in heartbreaking fashion to Edmonton in seven tough, hard-fought games. Oddly enough, Hextall was voted playoff MVP, the second such time a Flyer won the Conn Smythe Trophy despite being on the losing team, the other being Reggie Leach, in 1976.

Prior to the 1991-92 season, the Flyers acquired Rod Brind'Amour from St. Louis. Brind'Amour led the Flyers in goals (33), assists (44), and points (77) in his first season with the club. With Ron Sutter gone to St. Louis in the Brind'Amour trade, Rick Tocchet was named team captain. As the Flyers continued to flounder, Paul Holmgren was fired midway through the season and replaced by Bill Dineen, father of Flyer Kevin Dineen. On February 19, the Flyers and Pittsburgh made a major five-player deal which featured Tocchet — who never grew comfortably into the role of captain — heading to Pittsburgh and Mark Recchi coming to Philadelphia.

In 1992, The Flyers won the arbitration battle for 1991 #1 overall pick Eric Lindros against the Rangers. It was determined that Quebec had made a deal with the Flyers before making a deal with the Rangers. In order to acquire Lindros' rights, the Flyers parted with six players, trading Steve Duchesne, Peter Forsberg, Ron Hextall, Kerry Huffman, Mike Ricci, Chris Simon, a 1993 first round draft pick (Jocelyn Thibault), a 1994 first round draft pick (Nolan Baumgartner), and $15 million to Quebec.

The trio of Lindros, Recchi, and Brent Fedyk would form the Crazy Eights line in Lindros' first two years in the league, the eights being the player's jersey numbers (88, 8, and 18 respectively). In 1992-93, Recchi set the franchise record for points in a season with 123 (53 goals, 70 assists) and Lindros scored 41 goals in 61 games.

In order to shore up the defense, Ron Hextall was re-acquired from the Islanders and high-scoring winger Recchi was traded to Montreal for John LeClair, Eric Desjardins, and Gilbert Dionne early in the abbreviated season. Lindros and LeClair teamed with Renberg to form the Legion of Doom line, a mix of scoring talent and physical intimidation. Lindros came in second to Jaromir Jagr by a tiebreaker in the race for the Art Ross Trophy, but made up for it by capturing the Hart Memorial Trophy as the league's MVP. The playoff drought came to an end as the Flyers won their first division title in eight years and clinched the No.2 seed in the Eastern Conference. After dispatching Buffalo in five and sweeping the defending Stanley Cup champion Rangers, the Flyers lost in the Eastern Conference Finals to the eventual-champion New Jersey Devils in six games.

Lindros eclipsed the 100-point mark for the first time in 1995-96, gathering 115 points, and LeClair scored 51 goals, as the Flyers repeated as Atlantic Division champs and clinched the No.1 seed in the East. Facing the 8th-seeded Tampa Bay Lightning, the Flyers dropped two of the first three games. They rallied by winning three straight games to win the series. After taking two of the first three games against their second-round opponent, Florida, the Flyers were defeated in overtime in Game 4 and double-overtime in Game 5. An upstart Florida club with stellar goaltending from John Vanbiesbrouck ended the Flyers' season in Game 6. The Flyers had played their last game at the Spectrum and prepared to open a new arena the following season, Wachovia Center.

One of the most tumultuous seasons in franchise history, 1999-2000, actually started in July three months prior to the start of the regular season. In the span of a few days, longtime broadcaster Gene Hart died due to illness and defenseman Dmitri Tertyshny, coming off his rookie season, was killed in a freak boating accident. The season itself was no better as head coach Roger Neilson was diagnosed with bone cancer, forcing him to step aside in February 2000 to undergo treatment.

In the off-season, the Flyers re-vamped their lineup by signing Jeremy Roenick and finally trading Lindros to the Rangers for Kim Johnsson, Jan Hlavac, Pavel Brendl, and a 2003 3rd-round draft pick. Desjardins stepped down as team captain eight games into the season and was replaced by Primeau. The Flyers began 2001-02 with high expectations and with Roenick leading the team in scoring the Flyers finished with an Atlantic Division title.

With the NHL preparing for looming labor unrest, the Flyers let their leading scorer, Mark Recchi, leave for Pittsburgh during the off-season. Unsure about what the future would bring, the Flyers were unsure about Recchi's worth. The NHL Lockout would force the cancellation of the 2004-05 NHL season. The Flyers were one of the more active teams once the NHL Lockout came to an end. Replacing the high-profile names of Amonte, LeClair, and Roenick were superstar Peter Forsberg, along with defensemen Derian Hatcher and Mike Rathje, as well as several players from the Calder Cup-winning Philadelphia Phantoms. When all was said and done, the team had experienced a turnover of nearly two-thirds of the roster.

The Flyers began the season with lofty expectations. Despite being hampered by injuries prior to and during 2005-06, the Flyers lived up to those expectations in the first half of the season, reaching the top of the league standings in January while simultaneously holding a ten-point lead in the Atlantic Division. The Deuces Wild line of Forsberg, Gagne, and Mike Knuble recorded 75, 79, and 65 points respectively while Gagne, with Forsberg feeding him, scored a career high of 47 goals.

The Flyers' 40th year anniversary season turned out to be the worst in franchise history. Having lost Michal Handzus in a trade with Chicago, Kim Johnsson to free agency and Eric Desjardins and team captain Keith Primeau to retirement in the off-season, the Flyers found themselves without many leaders to guide the team. Peter Forsberg replaced Primeau as team captain, but a chronic foot injury had him in and out of the lineup throughout the season and limited his effectiveness. Eight games into the regular season and with a record of 1-6-1, General Manager Bobby Clarke resigned and head coach Ken Hitchcock was fired. Assistant coach John Stevens replaced Hitchcock and assistant general manager Paul Holmgren took on Clarke's responsibilities on an interim basis.

In the 2007 off-season, the Flyers made a June 18th trade which sent the first round draft pick they had acquired in the Forsberg trade back to Nashville for the rights to negotiate with impending unrestricted free agents Kimmo Timonen and Scott Hartnell. Both were signed to six-year contracts. After much speculation as to whether the Flyers would trade the 2nd overall pick in the 2007 NHL Entry Draft, the Flyers selected New Jersey native James vanRiemsdyk.