The low-hanging fruit is Owen Tippett, who has had a down year after signing an eight-year contract extension last winter. One of the bigger positive development stories under Tortorella originally, Tippett’s progression stagnated this year; he has fallen out of the team’s top six and has remained there even under Shaw.

An incident between John Tortorella and Philadelphia Flyers defenseman Cam York this week contributed to a deteriorating relationship between coach and team that led to Tortorella’s firing on Thursday morning, a team source said.

The Flyers fired John Tortorella with nine games left in his third season as head coach, a campaign mired with on-ice regression.