Will the Broad Street Bullies be back? Flyers go big at the NHL draft

By the time the Philadelphia Flyers are legitimate contenders again a few years down the road, they could have a lineup that makes the 1970s Broad Street Bullies proud.

Five of their eight selections in the NHL draft stand 6-foot-3 or taller, including first-rounders Porter Martone and Jack Nesbitt. They overlooked smaller talent to get a hulking winger in Martone at No. 6 and traded up for Nesbitt, a 6-5 center, with the 12th pick.

“It’s a nice bonus that they’re both tall and will bring us size, as well,” general manager Daniel Briere said. “It just kind of worked out that way. It wasn’t a plan that we had in mind going into the draft that we wanted to get bigger. It just happened that way.”

Philadelphia’s second-rounders were 6-6, 232-pound defenseman Carter Amico and a trio of nice-sized forwards: Jack Murtagh, Shane Vansaghi and Matthew Gard. Murtagh described himself as “a high-end workhorse.”

Their second fifth-round pick, Luke Vlooswyk, called himself “a big defensive, defenseman.” He said Gard, a teammate with the Western Hockey League’s Red Deer Rebels, is “a big kid like me.”

Bulking up the prospect pool makes sense for the Flyers, who have a lot of smaller talent in the system, from budding star Matvei Michkov already on the roster to 2024 first-rounder Jett Luchanko, who played four games for them last season. They also just traded for 6-foot center Trevor Zegras and could use some size in their not-too-distant future.

After William Horcoff, whose dad Shawn spent 15 seasons in the NHL, went 24th to Pittsburgh in the first round, Day 2 of the draft was full of the sons and nephews of retired players hearing their names called.

It started with Seattle trading up to get Blake Fiddler, son of Vernon, early in the second round. Eric Nilson, son of Marcus, went a handful of picks later to Anaheim.

There were more familiar names picked in the third round: Artyom Gonchar, nephew of 2009 Stanley Cup champion Sergei Gonchar, to the New York Rangers, and Blake Vanek, son of Thomas, to Ottawa.

After Simon Wang became the highest-ranked China-born NHL draft pick when San Jose chose him at No. 33, Matous Jan Kucharcik made some Italian hockey history.

Taken by Buffalo 103rd, Kucharcik is a Czech national but became the fourth player born in Italy to be selected.