John Tortorella’s Philadelphia Flyers (14-14-4) host Jim Hiller’s Los Angeles Kings (18-9-4) on Thursday night. Game time at the Wells Fargo Center is 7:30 p.m. EST.

The game will be streamed on Hulu/ESPN+. The radio broadcast will be on 97.5 The Fanatic with a 24-hour online simulcast on Flyers Radio.

This is the first of two meetings between the interconference clubs this season. The Flyers and Kings will face off again on December 29th in Los Angeles.

The Flyers come into this game after suffering a 6-4 road loss to the Detroit Red Wings on Wednesday night. Philly suffered from turnovers, penalty issues early in the game, poor puck support and two potentially stopable shots that ended up in the net. On the positive side, the Flyers demonstrated their resilience by overcoming 2-1 and 4-2 deficits.

The Kings enter their fifth game of a seven-game road trip. They are 2-1-1 on the trip so far. On Tuesday, LA suffered a 3-2 overtime loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins at PPG Paints Arena.

Here are five things to keep in mind during Thursday’s tilt:

1. Koly the goalkeeper

There will be no morning skate for the Flyers on Thursday because they played in Detroit the night before. However, it’s likely that rookie Aleksei Kolosov should start Thursday’s game regardless of what happened Wednesday against the Red Wings.

Last Thursday, Kolosov flirted with a shutout for 56 minutes in a 4-1 home win over the Red Wings. He was very sharp overall in this game and the only goal he scored was on a deflected puck that deflected off a teammate.

The Kings, meanwhile, have called up David Rittich for 16 starts in his 18 appearances (10-7-0, 2.49 goals against average, .890 save percentage). Veteran Darcy Kuemper has made 14 starts (7-2-4, 2.32 GAA, .915 save percentage, one shutout).

On Tuesday in Pittsburgh, Kuemper stopped 28 of 32 shots. Due to mishaps in front of him – uncharacteristic of the Kings – LA was unable to defend its lead in the third period. Additionally, the only goal assist he received were shots on goal from Adrian Kempe and Alex Turcotte.

2. Puck management

After a poor start to the season from both a structural and puck-handling perspective – which all too often resulted in the Flyers spending significantly more time on their own side of the ice than in attack – the Flyers spent most of their time blaming process-related issues on them in five-on-five games.

Unfortunately, Wednesday’s game in Detroit was a step backwards in terms of how the Flyers played with and without the puck. The Flyers paid the price for allowing too many odd man rushes. They were also guilty of poor line changes as Detroit had possession of the puck. Finally, puck support on the ice was inconsistent and there were too many D-zone sequences where opposing attackers got inside.

The mantras of “defend from the middle” and “look forward” to create attacking opportunities were not nearly sufficiently pronounced in Friday’s game. The Flyers need to get back on the boards in these areas against a strong LA club.

3. Line combinations and defensive pairs

The Flyers tested their line combinations and defensive pairings until the third period of Wednesday’s game. Additionally, top defender Cam York sat on the bench for the final 20 minutes of the game.

The only forward combination that Tortorella didn’t change on Thursday was the trio with Noah Cates in the middle of Tyson Foerster and Bobby Brink. The other three lines varied by shift. Scott Laughton moved from the left wing to center in the third period, while Ryan Poehling (usually the fourth line midfielder) moved to the left wing and ended up scoring his second goal of the season.

Will there be any lineup changes or combination adjustments at the start of Thursday’s game? Will defenseman Emil Andrae (who has been left out of the last three games) return to the Philadelphia lineup? How long will Tortorella wait in the game before juggling the forward lines again?

The Flyers had high line continuity over an eight-game stretch before in-game tweaks last Saturday in Minnesota and major changes on Wednesday. It will be interesting to see how the lines start against the Kings, how often they are moved (aside from normal after-PK or post-power play variations on the next shift), and how ice time is distributed in the second shift of the game the current four-on-six route.

4. Flyer special teams

The Flyers’ penalty shootout slump has continued since Thanksgiving. The normal fluctuations and short-term hiccups that occur to all teams were now a three-week free fall that dropped the Flyers from the top of the NHL to the middle of the pack (79.8 percent overall success rate).

Since Black Friday, the Flyers have scored nine opposing power play goals on 24 opportunities, for an abysmal PK rate of 62.5 percent. Meanwhile, the Kings PK finished in the top 10 on the season at 17 of 18 (94.4 percent) over the same period.

However, the power play has been an even bigger problem for the Kings this season than it has been for the Flyers. LA’s power play comes into Thursday’s game at 15.3 percent, ranking 28th in the league. The Flyers, who only had one power play opportunity in Wednesday’s game, are 26th in the NHL with a success rate of 16.5 percent.

5. Behind Enemy Lines: Kopitar

The seemingly ageless Anze Kopitar remains one of the NHL’s most consistent all-around centers. At age 37, the tall Slovenian center leads the Kings in points (35) and assists (27) while playing in all game situations (19:17 average ice time per game).

Kopitar, a perennial candidate for the Selke Trophy, is traditionally +15 this season. He also remains one of the most dominant faceoff players in the hockey world, particularly on his strong (left) side. Overall, Kopitar has won 57.1 percent of his draws this year: the seventh straight season in which the Kings have had immediate puck possession on 55 percent of their captain’s other draws.

In 1,404 career regular season games in the NHL, all with the Kings, Kopitar has recorded 427 goals, 819 assists, 1,246 points and an overall rating of +109. The two-time Selke Trophy winner has a pair of Stanley Cup rings, five NHL All-Star Game selections and two Lady Byng Trophies on his Hockey Hall of Fame-caliber resume.