<p>Silicon offers a high theoretical capacity, low operating voltage, and abundant reserves, making it a promising anode. Yet, its significant volume expansion during cycling remains a major barrier to practical use. Here, expanded graphite acts as an elastic scaffold coupled with a flexible N-rich carbon shell to integrate buffering, conductivity, and lithium storage. Through wet ball-milling, submicron silicon was uniformly dispersed within expanded graphite to form a conductive scaffold. Simultaneously, a phenolic/melamine-resorcinol-formaldehyde (MRF) hybrid resin was generated via liquid-phase <i>in situ</i> polymerization. Subsequently, pyrolysis of this resin yielded nitrogen-doped silicon/carbon composites (designated Si/EGMHC), in which the silicon particles are embedded within a nitrogen-rich hard-carbon layer. The nitrogen-doped carbon shell effectively isolates silicon nanoparticles from the electrolyte, while the low-graphitization hard carbon layer, possessing appreciable mechanical flexibility, helps alleviate stress concentration induced by the volumetric expansion of silicon particles. In addition, the nitrogen-doped carbon shell surface possesses more active sites, and these characteristics significantly enhance the lithium storage capacity of silicon particles. The prepared Si/EGMHC-0.5–3 exhibits outstanding electrochemical performance (991 mAh·g⁻¹ after 100 cycles at the current density of 0.1 A·g⁻¹) when used as a negative electrode material for lithium-ion batteries. This study provides a simple, economical, and feasible process strategy for the preparation of silicon-based anode materials.</p>