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 source said that after Tortorella benched York for the final 50 minutes of the Flyers’ game on Tuesday at Toronto, a confrontation took place between the two that did not turn physical but that “they probably both crossed the line.”

As a result, York was functionally scratched on Thursday in a victory over the Montreal Canadiens, although he sat on the bench for the entire game because the Flyers had no healthy extra players. Interim coach Brad Shaw called it a “disciplinary issue,” and the team source said the decision to sit York was made by general manager Daniel Briere, who felt the team needed to make a point with York — who is expected to return to the lineup on Saturday.

But he won’t be playing under Tortorella, who has not responded to multiple interview requests from The Athletic since his firing.

The disagreement with York, and subsequent comments that Tortorella made after the game, contributed to the coach’s firing on Thursday morning. But those two events were not isolated. Something began to shift around the trade deadline on March 7, according to the team source.

Up until then, Tortorella seemed to be on board with the moves that Briere made, as the Flyers traded respected leaders Scott Laughton and Erik Johnson, further reducing a roster that had lost top-nine forwards Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee about a month earlier. But there was a heaviness around the team stemming from some of Tortorella’s reactions in the days and weeks that followed.

A disconnect started to grow between Tortorella, the team and Flyers management, culminating on Tuesday in Toronto, where the coach’s postgame comments didn’t help his cause, either, according to the team source.

As colleague Pierre LeBrun reported on Friday morning, the timing of Tortorella’s dismissal “was surprising. The indication from the Flyers earlier this week was that they wanted to sit down after the season with the 66-year-old coach, who had another year on his deal, to see where he was at, mentally and physically.”

Shaw said on Friday that Tortorella “left a note in our (coaches) room and in the players’ room when he came and got his stuff. That’s the type of guy he is.”

There had seemingly been tension bubbling between Tortorella and York for the past few weeks. York was made a healthy scratch for a game on March 8, and later bemoaned the lack of communication from the coach.

“We haven’t talked much, so I’m not sure,” he told reporters two days later, when asked why he thought he was scratched.

He also added: “I mean, I’m not playing to prove him anything. I’m playing for the guys in this locker room and the logo on my chest. I’m not playing for him, necessarily, if that makes sense.”

On Friday, speaking for the first time since being benched and then punished, York said:  “I’m not going to get into the details of it. I will say this, I take full responsibility for my actions. It’s been addressed here in the locker room. It’s something that I’m going to put behind me and move on from. We’ve got eight games left here and that’s my focus right now. We’ll leave it at that.”

Still, he admitted frustration with watching the team get shellacked 7-2 by the Maple Leafs, as they had only five defensemen playing for the majority of the game at the end of a 10-day road trip.

“Obviously, sitting on the bench there in that type of game is never fun,” he said.  “Five (defensemen) is a tough thing to do and you never want to put your teammates in that type of situation.”

Shaw was asked whether he would do something like bench a player for 50 minutes, as Tortorella did on Tuesday.

“I’m not going to get into that,” he said. “I don’t want to answer a question that can be used against Torts. I don’t think it’s anybody’s best interests, so I’d rather not answer that.”

In 58 games this season, York has four goals and 11 assists for 15 points. The 24-year-old is a pending restricted free agent. There were discussions about a contract extension earlier in the season, but not much progress made.

York reiterated his desire to be a part of the Flyers’ future on Friday.

“This is where I want to be,” York said. “I’ve stated that. I love what’s going on here and I love what we’re building. It hasn’t been our (best) year, but it’s here. This is where I want to be, and I’m looking forward to the future.”

Regarding Tortorella, York said: “I have nothing bad to say. He taught me a lot of really good things and was a really good coach for me. I’m going to use a lot of the things that he taught me down the road in my career. He’s a really good coach, and I wish him the best of luck down the road.”

(Photo: Robert Edwards / Imagn Images)

Shaqir O’Neal, the son of basketball Hall of Famer Shaquille O’Neal, has made a big decision about his basketball future. 

Shaqir is leaving Florida A&M and entering the NCAA transfer portal, On3 reported. 

The junior forward averaged 6.7 points and 3.4 rebounds per game during the 2024-25 season with the Rattlers.

If he does transfer, O’Neal would finish his career in Tallahassee having started 17 of 29 games.

BROOME, AUBURN FLEX THEIR MUSCLES IN SWEET 16 WIN OVER MICHIGAN

This wouldn’t be the first time in O’Neal’s college basketball career he’s switched schools. He transferred to Florida A&M after a two-year stint at Texas Southern.

Trevin Knell (21) of the Brigham Young Cougars pressures Shaqir O’Neal (8) of the Florida A&M Rattlers as he drives to the basket during the first half of a game at the Marriott Center Dec. 20, 2024, in Provo, Utah. (Chris Gardner/Getty Images)

O’Neal appeared in 41 games during his time with the Tigers, starting in two games. He was listed as a three-star high school recruit, according to his bio on Florida A&M’s athletics website.

Basketball runs deep in the O’Neal family. 

Shaquille O’Neal smiles before a game between the New Orleans Pelicans and Los Angeles Lakers as part of the 2023 NBA In-Season Tournament Dec. 7, 2023, at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.  (Mike Kirschbaum/NBAE via Getty Images)

Shaq won four NBA championships and was a 15-time All-Star during his storied career. His other son, Shaereef, played at UCLA and LSU before a stint in the NBA G League.

In 2023, Shaq’s youngest child, Me’Arah O’Neal, signed her national letter of intent to play for the Florida Gators. She made her debut with Florida during the 2024-25 season and recorded a career-high 19 points in a game against Arkansas in February.

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Roki Sasaki chose right when he signed with the Dodgers.

Never mind not being ready to lead the rotation of another team and challenge Shohei Ohtani. The 23-year-old Sasaki doesn’t look ready to pitch in the major leagues.

Sasaki made his second start for the Dodgers on Saturday night, and it was somehow worse than his first. He didn’t make it out of the second inning of a 7-3 victory over the Detroit Tigers at Dodger Stadium, his control problems even more pronounced than they were in his debut in Tokyo.

He recorded only five outs. He walked four. He was charged with three hits and two runs. Of the 61 pitches he threw, only 32 were strikes.

This disheartening start to his major league career — he walked five batters in three innings in his previous start against the Chicago Cubs — shouldn’t sound any alarm bells, but that’s only because he’s playing for the Dodgers.

If Sasaki needs another start or two to get acclimated to the pitch clock or low-quality American baseballs, the Dodgers can afford to give them to him.

If he needs to spend time refining his delivery in the minor leagues, the Dodgers have the necessary depth to cover his absence.

Sasaki won’t have a rookie season like Fernando Valenzuela’s or Dwight Gooden’s, but the Dodgers don’t need him to. The Dodgers are World Series favorites with or without him, and they have the luxury of treating him as if he’s a prospect without compromising their championship ambitions.

His circumstances would be completely different if he’d signed with another team. On the San Diego Padres, he probably would have started the season as the No. 3 starter. Him pitching like this would have erased whatever chance the Padres had of dethroning the Dodgers in the National League West. The pressure to perform would be greater by several orders of magnitude.

However, there is a downside to not being needed, as Sasaki is with the Dodgers, which is that a player can be forgotten. Around this time last year, Bobby Miller was viewed as a star in the making. Miller didn’t have the season the Dodgers envisioned, as his performance declined and his health failed him. He started this season with the franchise’s triple-A affiliate in Oklahoma City.