PHILADELPHIA — It was only a preseason game, and one in his new home and not at the Garden.
So all the emotions were not going to hit Kevin Hayes just yet Saturday night at Wells Fargo Center, when the center took the ice in a Flyers sweater to face the Rangers for the first time since they traded him in February and continued their rebuild without him.
But certain feelings still remain. And after a brief detour to Winnipeg, Hayes is back in the Metropolitan Division, meaning he will see plenty of the team with which he spent his first four and a half seasons in the NHL, however different it may look.