PHILADELPHIA — Philadelphia Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren has a long-term plan for the organization, and to his credit, he has stuck to it the last three seasons.

It’s becoming quite clear that the idea was to acquire young players with high ceilings, stick with them through thick and thin and let them grow together.

The reward has been a young nucleus of players ranging in ages from 21 to 27 that has developed, along with 26-year-old captain Claude Giroux, and could have the Flyers on the cusp of a successful run over the next couple years.

And since adding each of the players, Holmgren has kept his finger on the trigger when given the chance to pull it and make a deal for an older veteran and quick fix. He proved his patience and commitment to the plan again this past week when the trade deadline passed on Wednesday afternoon without any player from the nucleus leaving town.

"Obviously the world we live in it's tough to go out and buy a team and trade all of your young guys," defenseman Luke Schenn said following Wednesday's wild 6-4 win over the Capitals. "We need to keep those guys and build from within. I think we have some good young players here.

“Everyone wants to win for each other and sticks up for each other. I am really happy they kept the core together.”

The two deals Holmgren made were trading for Islanders defenseman Andrew MacDonald for a minor leaguer and two picks on Tuesday and then shipping D-man Andrej Meszaros to Boston for a conditional pick on Wednesday. Although MacDonald is an unrestricted free agent after the season, the 27 year old has already indicated he wouldn't mind remaining in Philadelphia and the feeling is mutual.

“Andrew MacDonald is a guy we focused on,” Holmgren said on Wednesday. “We believe he will make our team better. With an eye on the future, we have an interest in keeping Andrew longer term. He’s a solid, two-way defenseman in our league and he’s still young, too. He brings a lot to the table. He is going to make our team better.”

The one deal he did make that shipped a young star out of town — James van Riemsdyk to Toronto for Schenn (24 years old) — so far hasn’t gone the Flyers’ way, but at least he got another young player in return. JVR is on pace for his first 30-goal campaign while Schenn has many holes in his game to sew up.

The master plan took shape following the 2011 season, when the Flyers were ousted in the second round of the playoffs by the Boston Bruins. In one of the biggest shake-ups of an organization in this town, Holmgren traded captain Mike Richards and all-star Jeff Carter on the same day — and subsequently signed goalie Ilya Bryzgalov.

In return, he netted Wayne Simmonds (25) and Luke's younger brother, Brayden (22), from the Kings for Richards, and landed Jakub Voracek (24) and the eighth pick in the draft from the Blue Jackets that turned into Sean Couturier (21).

Before the 2011-2012 season, the Flyers signed Matt Read (27) and plucked Michael Raffl (25) out of Europe last summer. They also have highly touted prospects and first-round picks Scott Laughton and Sam Morin playing in juniors.

The Bryzgalov move was the one time Holmgren deviated from the plan and it ended up backfiring. The then aloof 31-year-old netminder never fit in and the Flyers used their amnesty buyout on him last summer. After originally signing him, they traded then 22-year-old goalie Sergei Bobrovsky — for some high picks — to Columbus where he won the Vezina trophy, awarded to the league's best goalie, last season.

Although Holmgren has had his chances to break from the script, the GM has all but refrained from trading anyone from the core. Rumors surfaced earlier in the week that the Flyers were in play for Vancouver forward Ryan Kesler and that any deal would have involved Brayden Schenn or Couturier. Holmgren downplayed the reports.

“It’s nice to have the same group of guys together,” Raffl said. “We have been playing together for months now and we know each other well and think we have a good group of guys that can really achieve something.”

The Flyers have given them the chance.

“(The front office) kind of made a lot of trades a couple years ago and brought in a lot of new guys and young guys and now they are letting us grow together,” Luke Schenn said. “Last year we didn’t make the playoffs and everyone was a bit on edge and then we started this year slow. They could have shaken a few things up, but they let us ride through it and hopefully we will get rewarded for it.

“We have a long way to go to make the playoffs but I can tell you for sure everyone wants to be here. We have a great group of young guys and older veterans that care for each other and really want to win.”

That is the plan, and Holmgren is sticking to it.