Inside Ivan Provorov’s Pride Night snub and the Flyers’ organizational fallout

The Philadelphia Flyers have become the center of intense debate as a result of Ivan Provorov’s choice to sit out warmups for the team’s Pride Night.
Provorov decided not to join his teammates in warmups for Tuesday’s game against the Anaheim Ducks because the team would be wearing Pride-themed jerseys. After the game, Provorov cited his Russian Orthodox religious beliefs as his justification for not participating.
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“I respect everybody, and I respect everybody’s choices. My choice is to stay true to myself and my religion,” Provorov said in the locker room after Philadelphia’s 5-2 victory.
The result has been a deluge of talk throughout the sports world regarding Provorov’s decision and its impact on the LGBTQ+ community that the team’s Pride Night was meant to support.
How exactly did the Flyers get here?
In short, there was a communication breakdown between the two sides of the organization: hockey operations, which believed they had chosen the right path in the moment, and business operations, which was not kept fully abreast of the developing situation.
The Athletic spoke to three team sources for this story who were granted anonymity to allow them to speak candidly and preserve professional relationships.
The nature of the organization’s response to Provorov’s decision — specifically, the release of a statement just minutes before postgame media availability Tuesday — hinted that part of the organization was blindsided. Based on conversations with sources, that was true for the ownership/business operations side.
Tortorella said Thursday that wasn’t the case for the hockey side of the Flyers. He knew that Provorov might not wear the Pride Night jersey as far back as a week ago.
Per Flyers forward James van Riemsdyk, the idea for the team to wear jerseys during Pride Night warmups started a few weeks ago. According to a team official, it was communicated by hockey operations to business operations about a week ago that the players were strongly considering doing so.
In the past, the Flyers had only used optional Pride tape on their sticks. So, the business department — which already had a news release drawn up without reference to jerseys being worn for warmups — waited for the final go-ahead on the decision.
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But by Friday of last week, prior to the team’s road trip, Provorov made it clear that he had misgivings about wearing the jersey.
“Myself, Provy and (general manager) Chuck (Fletcher) had conversations along the way here,” Tortorella said. “And then I talked to some players. I talked to (Scott Laughton), Laughts is so close to it with his family and all, and I wanted to show him the respect.”
Provorov was given the opportunity to reflect for a few days on whether he would be willing to wear the jersey during warmups, but that he should expect his teammates would be doing so regardless. Those involved in the discussion did not know what decision Provorov would ultimately make. But in the interim — between Friday and Tuesday — Flyers business operations was not made aware of the possibility that Provorov would not participate in a pregame skate while wearing the Pride jersey.
A source within hockey operations contended that, at the very least, the business side was informed over the weekend that Provorov was reflecting upon his potential participation. However, the understanding of the business department was that the team was still deciding whether they would all wear the jerseys, not Provorov specifically.
Per a team source, by Monday night when the club returned home from its 6-0 loss in Boston, Provorov had told members of the hockey operations staff that he was not going to participate in warmups. However, there remained some hope on their part that Provorov might change his mind in the leadup to puck drop.
On Tuesday morning, hockey operations communicated to the business department that the team was going to wear the Pride jerseys. Notably, there was no mention of Provorov’s plan to avoid warmups. The business department then put out an edited news release in the early afternoon accounting for the addition of warmup jerseys to Pride Night.
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The uncertainty or lack of awareness regarding Provorov’s intentions wasn’t limited to the business department. Van Riemsdyk, one of the Flyers’ two player leaders of the event, wasn’t fully in the loop on Provorov’s plans.
“I kind of figured it out to be honest with you, when we went out for the warmups,” van Riemsdyk said Thursday. “I mean, it wasn’t necessarily something that was talked about collectively, I don’t think, before the game. But obviously, as it got closer and closer to that, I think, I kind of started to realize what was going on.”
Despite not taking part in warmups, Provorov played. The Flyers released their statement on the situation just after the game ended. Provorov explained his decision to the media, and Tortorella provided additional context.
On Thursday, in his first availability since the game, Tortorella explained in detail why he played Provorov.
This season, Tortorella has scratched high-profile players — such as Kevin Hayes, Tony DeAngelo and Rasmus Ristolainen — for hockey-related reasons. The coach sets the lineup, and he chose to include Provorov.
Tortorella shed light on his part in the decision-making process. For him, it partly went back to a controversy of his own when he was coaching Team USA at the World Cup of Hockey in 2016. It was weeks after NFL player Colin Kaepernick began his protest (first sitting, and then kneeling) during the American national anthem.
“When I was asked a question about the flag — that’s when Kaepernick was sitting, he wasn’t kneeling, he was just sitting at that time — they asked me if a player sits, what would you do?” he said. “And what did I say? I said the player would sit the rest of the game.”
Since then, however, Tortorella has changed his stance — not on the protest itself, but on what his reaction to it would be, in terms of playing status.
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“I was wrong. I learned a lot through that experience,” he said. “My feelings toward any type of protest to the flag during the anthem — it disgusts me. To this day, it disgusts me. It shouldn’t be done. Those are my feelings. (But) I can’t push those feelings onto someone else. I was wrong in saying that back then. I didn’t realize I was, but as I went through it all … who am I to push my feelings onto someone else?”
Now, the anthem protests and Provorov’s decision to sit out warmups aren’t exactly an apples-to-apples comparison, but in Tortorella’s mind, the two were similar enough.
“Why would I bench him? Because of a decision he’s making on his beliefs and religion?” Tortorella said. “It turned out to be a great night for Pride Night. Players were involved. The building was filled, there was awareness, everything. Provy didn’t actively seek out and try to make a stand against it. He just felt he didn’t want to take warmup. I respect him for his decision.”
Tortorella wasn’t alone in his belief that Provorov should play. The other higher-ups in hockey operations were involved in the process as well. There was an internal agreement with Tortorella that this was the right way forward and also an understanding of the NHL’s position on the matter. The league does not want players to be disciplined in relation to promotional events such as Pride Night or Military Appreciation Night. The NHL confirmed that with its statement following Tuesday’s game, which concluded with, “players are free to decide which initiatives to support, and we continue to encourage their voices and perspectives on social and cultural issues.”
The Flyers could have chosen to scrap the jersey idea entirely once Provorov made his decision, believing that the message would be undercut by the lack of team unity. But Tortorella said Thursday that he didn’t believe Provorov’s absence detracted from the message.
“No, because it was someone’s certain strong beliefs,” he said. “Do you know how much time the organization and the players put into Pride Night? How much they wanted to be involved in that? We forget that. Because one person and his religion and his beliefs did not want to partake in the 15-minute warmup.
“Provy knew he was going to have some blowback here. That’s part of the business. That’s part of what you go through. But I respect him as far as staying true to himself, as I said the other night. And I respect the organization, how they handled themselves here. Because they went about their business. And I thought it was a great night, Pride Night.”
There’s frustration from parts of the Flyers organization that the other aspects of the team’s Pride Night have largely been ignored due to the Provorov controversy. Tortorella shared some of that sentiment Thursday, which isn’t limited to him.
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“For me — and I don’t get too involved in all of it because I have to worry about the hockey team — (Pride Night) brings great awareness to people that have had some struggles,” he said. “And I think we’re losing a little of that in focusing on Provy and his beliefs. There were still a lot of really good things that happened that night for these people. Players brought them down (to ice level), Reems and Laughts and the boys were involved. I thought it was great.”
Van Riemsdyk recalled one interaction in particular from the night that stuck with him.
“We met a kid who we hosted (for their pregame meet-and-greet program) in the year who came back and was showing us pictures playing hockey and videos playing hockey,” he said. “So that’s what it’s all about for me. I think it just shows the positive impact that that we can have, with things like that that we’re trying to do.”
Tortorella bristled at the argument that the event as a whole was overshadowed by Provorov’s decision and his continued presence in the Flyers’ lineup despite it.
“People are pissing and moaning that we embarrassed … that the organization embarrassed (ourselves),” he said. “I don’t look at it that way at all. Because so many people in this organization put so much time into this because it’s so important to them.”
(Photo: Tim Nwachukwu / Getty Images)