Cole Knuble’s Two-Goal Night Was Great. Now Comes the Grind.

Three straight. After an 0-6-3 start, the Flyers have won three in a row, and Wednesday's 3-1 win in Buffalo was the most fun of the three.

Cole Knuble scored the first two goals of his NHL career in his second NHL game. Oliver Bonk set up both of them. Matvei Michkov finally played real minutes. Dan Vladar did the rest.

My take: enjoy it, but don't fall for it. Knuble and Alex Bump have been great stories. If they can't get consistent minutes once Travis Konecny and Owen Tippett are back, you send them back to Lehigh Valley. That isn't a problem. If anything, it puts some pressure on Tippett, Konecny and Tyson Foerster to step their games up.

Here's what's going on

Knuble opened the scoring at 14:49 of the first. Bonk's shot got saved, Knuble grabbed the rebound and buried it on his backhand with his parents in the stands. His dad, Mike Knuble, played 338 regular-season games for the Flyers.

Trevor Zegras made it 2-0 on the power play with 43 seconds left in the first, batting the rebound of a Michkov shot out of the air. Jason Zucker got one back on a Buffalo power play late in the second. Knuble put it away at 3:03 of the third, again off a Bonk shot.

Vladar stopped 27 of 28. Buffalo outshot the Flyers 16-9 in the first period alone, and the Flyers couldn't score on a 5-on-3 that lasted more than a minute in the second.

Vladar stole this one

The scoreboard says 3-1. The process says Buffalo had the better night.

The Sabres had more shot attempts, 50 to 44. They had more attempts from the slot, 22 to 19. By InStat's expected goals, Buffalo created 3.38 to the Flyers' 2.70. The shots Vladar actually faced were worth 2.10 expected goals and he allowed one. Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen faced 1.86 and allowed three.

That's a goalie stealing a game and a team finishing every chance it got.

Look at where the goals came from. All three Flyers goals came from the inner slot, two of them Knuble's. Buffalo had the same seven inner slot attempts and scored once.

This may be the best one-two goalie tandem the Flyers have had this century. Twelve games in, they look incredible. Joseph Woll has a .917 save percentage on a team that started 0-6-3, and over his last three starts Vladar has a .953 save percentage and a 1.30 goals-against average, per NBC Sports Philadelphia. His season number still carries the rough start. The last week is the version the Flyers signed.

Knuble: two shots, two goals

Knuble played 10:24. He had two shots, both from the inner slot, worth 0.45 expected goals combined. Both went in. His line with Jacob Gaucher and Denver Barkey played 6:13 together at 5-on-5 and won it 2-0.

Here's the other side of it. By InStat, Knuble spent 3:43 of his night defending and 1:16 attacking. Buffalo had 1.15 expected goals with him on the ice.

We've fallen into this trap as Flyers fans before. A young player comes up, he's riding the adrenaline, and he plays out of his mind for a short stretch. Then the schedule catches up to him. This is professional hockey and the NHL is an absolute grind.

You may need to keep him up and play him. But as soon as he hits a rut, you can't be afraid to send him back to Lehigh.

The M&M line is real

Michkov played 18:02, per NHL.com. Finally. He has six goals and eight points in 12 games, and he picked up the primary assist on the Zegras goal.

With Michkov on the ice, Buffalo generated 0.16 expected goals all night. Same with Porter Martone. Michkov's shot attempt share was 62 percent. Martone's was 55.

Martone and Michkov look like they'll be staying together, and they could really be the top-line players of the future we hoped they would be. What they need is a center. Noah Cates centered them Wednesday and that line broke even at 5-on-5, 5-5 in shot attempts over 8:18.

Finding them a center should be the top priority. If it isn't a trade, start developing Jett Luchanko in the back half of the season so he builds chemistry with those two. It's a young line, but it has the makings of something elite.

Bonk is here to stay

Bonk played 19:34 and had two primary assists. He and Travis Sanheim won their minutes 14-10 in shot attempts and 2-0 in goals. Bonk was on the ice for 0.84 expected goals for and 0.50 against, the best split of any Flyers defenseman.

When Rasmus Ristolainen and Cam York come back, you don't stop playing Oliver Bonk. Simon Benoit sits. My pairs are Sanheim with Bonk, Nick Seeler with Jamie Drysdale and York with Ristolainen, with David Jiricek as the seventh defenseman.

Here's what I'd like to see moving forward

Konecny and Tippett are coming back. Somebody has to go.

Gaucher goes first. He played 8:55 on Wednesday, the fewest of any Flyer, and he's the furthest from a regular NHL role. Hunter McDonald goes back down on defense.

Then it's Bump. He played 15:45 in the top six Wednesday with Sean Couturier and Foerster and didn't register a point. That line lost its 5-on-5 minutes 7-10 in shot attempts. Bump has no points through five games this season. That isn't a knock on him. Danny Briere already gave us the logic when he loaned Bump down after the Michael Bunting signing. If he isn't getting top-six minutes here, he should be getting them in Lehigh Valley.

I'd rather Knuble and Bump play over Bunting and Noel Acciari. I just don't see that happening, except maybe Bunting at times. Bunting didn't dress Wednesday, so Knuble may get a longer runway than Bump. He stays until the first rut.

None of this is a problem. It should put real pressure on the veterans. Foerster has one goal in 11 games. Tippett has two points in nine.

There's another piece to this. Tippett's and Foerster's trade value couldn't be any lower right now, and if the Flyers want to play the young kids more, someone is going to have to get moved. I'll get into exactly that tomorrow when I map out what Simon Edvinsson would cost.

Three straight wins, and they've looked good doing it. Just don't let one two-goal night make a roster decision for you.

Who goes down first when Konecny and Tippett are back? Let me know on X @BroadStBreakout.

Sources and data notes

Game tracking data, including shot attempts, expected goals, slot shots, line and pair results, and the shot charts, comes from InStat Hockey. Ice time, shots on goal and the goal summary come from NHL.com. Season stats are from NHL.com through Oct. 21. Vladar's last-three-starts numbers are from NBC Sports Philadelphia. Goal details are from Field Level Media and CBS Philadelphia.