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Will Flyers keep offensive core together after collapse?

Giroux, Voracek and Co. have been together for six seasons and the team has won only one playoff series.

The Flyers' offensive core - Claude Giroux, Wayne Simmonds, Jake Voracek, Brayden Schenn, and Sean Couturier - has been together for six seasons, during which the team has made the playoffs only three times and won just one series.

In many of those seasons, those five forwards have been among the Flyers' most productive players. But it hasn't been enough, and combined with defensive shortcomings, the Flyers have been the definition of mediocrity over the last four years: a 178-143-55 record.

Or, put another way: 178 wins and 198 losses.

Which raises the question: Is it time to break up the quintet and go in a different direction next season?

"Obviously, you're going to have three or four different players; you have that almost single year," Voracek said Tuesday after the Flyers met with coaches and general manager Ron Hextall at the Skate Zone in Voorhees. "It's rare that it happens that you sign all 23 guys on the team the next year. Obviously, everybody said that we had a very tight group and a great group of guys. But obviously it's a part of business - if you don't do well, break it up."

"When you don't make the playoffs, when you don't meet your expectations, change might happen," Giroux said. "But at the end of the day, it's not up to us. . . . We like our team, we like our group. We didn't really change from last year. I think with Fil [Valtteri Filppula] coming in this year, it really helped our depth. He brings a lot to the team."

Voracek said he thinks the core group of forwards deserves to remain together, but he conceded that one playoff series win in six years is "not good enough. We're in our prime years. We've got to make sure that we step up our game and get this team to the playoffs and start winning some series because if we don't it's going to get blown up."

Giroux said the team was "not far off. We've shown that we can be a good team, but good teams are a little more consistent than what we were this year. It's just a couple games that we let get away from us."

The Flyers finished tied for 20th in goals allowed (2.82 per game), which wasn't much different from the defending Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins (2.79).

But the Flyers averaged just 2.59 goals per game (which was also tied for 20th) while the Penguins averaged an NHL-best 3.39 goals per contest.

That explains why the Penguins had 111 points - second in the NHL - and the Flyers managed 88 (19th).

The Flyers averaged 3.2 goals in their first 32 games (third in the NHL), and 2.2 in their last 50 games (28th). One of the factors was the power play, which was clicking at 23.5 percent (second in the NHL) in the first 32 games, and dropped to 16.4 percent (24th) in the final 50 games. (The penalty kill also dropped significantly in that span.)

"If I had the answer, I don't think we'd be sitting here right now; we'd be in the playoffs," Voracek said when asked to explain the Flyers' stunning offensive nosedive. "Obviously, the games get tighter after Christmas, so you have to adjust. Simply we just weren't good enough to make the playoffs."

"The well went dry," Simmonds said. "I don't know how to explain it. I felt like we were getting opportunities, good scoring chances in good areas, and we just couldn't put the puck in the net. Eventually that was our downfall. . . . I think toward the end of the year we started getting it back, we started putting more pucks in the back of the net, and I think that's more indicative of our team."

The Flyers had a 19-10-3 record when they won their 10th straight game Dec. 14. At that point, they had more points than Washington, which finished with an NHL-leading 118 points. Only three teams (Montreal, Pittsburgh, Chicago) had more points than the Flyers at that time.

From that point, however, they won just 20 of their last 50 games (20-23-7) and scored 110 goals. Only New Jersey and Colorado scored fewer in that span.

The Flyers offense did improve late in the season when Jordan Weal was promoted from the Phantoms and Filppula was acquired from Tampa Bay. That gave the lines much more balance.

"We started making plays when they were there and started making better decisions," Giroux said. "It's like we didn't have a bus on our shoulder when we had the puck. We just played hockey."

scarchidi@phillynews.com

@BroadStBull