Flyers moving on from interim HC Mike Yeo

The Philadelphia Flyers fired then-head coach Alain Vigneault back on Dec. 6 following a 7-1 blowout loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning and sat at 8-10-4 when assistant coach Mike Yeo was named interim coach. Yeo could only do so much to stop the bleeding, and the Flyers ended the season at 25-46-11, dead last in the Metropolitan Division standings and 15th in the Eastern Conference above only the Montreal Canadiens.

As had been widely expected, Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher confirmed Tuesday that Yeo won't be Philadelphia's head coach next fall. 

"I met with Mike yesterday and I advised him he won't be our head coach for next season," Fletcher explained while speaking with reporters, according to Tom Gulitti of the NHL's website. "We dealt Mike a really tough hand. He's a good coach. I thought he did a really good job under the circumstances. He kept our players competing and playing hard to the end."

Under Yeo, the Flyers tallied a 17-36-7 mark during what quickly became a lost campaign. Fletcher said he'd like Yeo to remain with the Flyers in some role but added the coach is "free to speak to other teams right now" about openings. 

"Depending on how things go over the next six weeks on his end, our end, I'd love to find an opportunity, whether it's in coaching, player development, front office, scouting," Fletcher said of Yeo potentially working for the Flyers in 2022-23. "He's a good hockey man. He has a lot of experience, a lot of good ideas, obviously has a lot of first-hand information on our players and the environment."

Per Greg Wyshynski of ESPN, Fletcher didn't say when a head coach could be hired this spring or summer. The Flyers' hockey operations department will be tasked with finding Yeo's full-time replacement.