Tortorella: Flyers may be rebuilding, but 'we're better than this'

John Tortorella knows no one has predicted Philadelphia to win it all this season, but he still expects more from the Flyers, who've started the campaign 1-5-1.

"We're young, we're rebuilding, we are gonna take some gut punches, but we're better than this," the head coach said Friday, per PHLY Sports' Charlie O'Connor. "Easy."

The Flyers beat the Vancouver Canucks 3-2 in a shootout to open their season but dropped their next six games and rescued only one point in an overtime loss to the Edmonton Oilers. Philadelphia has allowed a league-worst 29 goals over its current skid.

Tortorella's forward line combinations are one aspect that's drawn plenty of attention. Through the first six contests of the campaign, Philadelphia has penciled in 18 different iterations to start games. No Flyers line has spent more than 20 minutes together at five-on-five this season, per Evolving-Hockey.

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"With the line combinations, it's not like I'm a mad scientist back there just trying to throw things around," Tortorella said, according to The Hockey News' Siobhan Nolan. "Especially in the situation where, right now, we're struggling offensively."

He continued, "The only decision I make with the lines is I'm trying to help the team. When the team struggles offensively, I think I need to. If I didn't, you'd probably say, 'Why the hell has he not changed the lines?'"

The Flyers sit 29th in the league in goals per game (2.29) and 20th in shots per game (28.4). They've also mustered just seven tallies at five-on-five while allowing 21, which is tied for the fourth most in the league.

"Do I make the right decisions? I don't know," Tortorella added."I certainly haven't made enough here because we still aren't scoring. There's no true answer to it."

On top of figuring out the best way to deploy the roster, there's another decision looming for the Flyers. Forward Jett Luchanko, the 13th overall pick at this past summer's draft, has impressed the big club with his speed through the first four games of his NHL career.

If Luchanko appears in more than nine outings, Philadelphia will burn the first year of his entry-level deal. He's missed three games as a healthy scratch - including the team's latest back-to-back - as the Flyers keep an eye on his development.

It appears that Tortorella has yet to decide whether to send Luchanko back to the OHL's Guelph Storm.

"With Jett, in the mess we're in right now at the start of the year, I'm not looking for an 18-year-old to try to get us out of it," Tortorella said, per O'Connor. "It's still a state of flux with him as far as what we do. ... It's hard to throw him in there right now in trying to help us out of that mess."

The Flyers face the Minnesota Wild on Saturday at 1 p.m. ET.

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