Heading into this season, it seemed clear that the Flyers were once again entering the year without an out-and-out starting goaltender to play the majority of the games. Samuel Ersson returned to take over his role as the “1B” sort of starter who would more than likely not play more than 45 games, Ivan Fedotov was traded to Columbus, and Aleksei Kolosov was rightfully sent to Lehigh Valley in order to try and rebuild his game after a turbulent 2024-25.
That all cleared the way for Dan Vladar, the Flyers’ only goaltending signing of the offseason, to play a sizable role alongside Ersson in taking on a bulk of the NHL game time.