PHANTOMS
Lehigh Valley

2-3

MARLIES
Toronto

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings: 

[one_half]Knight – Varone – Carey
Conner – Vorobyev – Lindblom
Aube-Kubel – Vecchione – Martel
Goulbourne – Bardreau – McDonald[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Myers – Sanheim
Friedman – Brennan
Lamarche – Willcox[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders:
Lyon
Tokarski

Scratches:

Sam Morin, Will O’Neill, Steven Swavely, Radel Fazleev, Morgan Frost, Carsen Twarynski, Frank Hora, Pascal Laberge, Alex Krushelnyski, David Drake, James de Haas, Anthony Stolarz, John Muse

Injury List:

Game Report

After a disappointing one-goal loss to the Marlies on Saturday afternoon, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms knew they needed to stay focused and hit the ice with full energy on Sunday for the second game of the series.

However, the Marlies had a different idea to start this game. They pinned the Phantoms in their defensive zone for most of the first period, outshooting them a whopping 20-9 in the opening frame.

To make matters worse, Lehigh Valley found themselves shorthanded three times in the period. Mark Friedman, however, got the visiting team on the board first with Lehigh Valley’s second shot on goal in the game. But the Marlies came back on one of their power play opportunities to tie the game at 1-1 before first intermission.

The second period evened out significantly, with no scoring and some back-and-forth equality in the penalty box.  Chippiness began to rear its ugly head, but nothing out of control.

Things heated up again in the third period as both teams exchanged goals quickly. Mikhail Vorobyev wristed the puck top shelf over Garret Sparks to give the Phantoms a 2-1 lead, but 23 seconds later Carl Grundstrom fired the puck short side past Alex Lyon to even the score yet again.

Despite some spectacular chances at both ends of the ice, neither goaltender was giving an inch and the game was forced into overtime. The Phantoms initially believed they had the game winner in the back of the net just over a minute into the extra frame, but it was waved off as the puck never actually entered the net.

Lyon and Sparks traded more highlight-reel saves, and eventually Miro Aaltonen came in hard to haunt the Phantoms in a second consecutive game and give Toronto a 2-0 series lead.

The Marlies and Phantoms now travel to Allentown where games three, four and five will take place on the Phantoms’ home ice.

▲     Alex Lyon, Danick Martel, Mikhail Vorobyev, Mark Friedman

▼     Greg Carey, Oskar Lindblom

1. Garret Sparks  TOR
2. Alex Lyon  LV
3. Miro Aaltonen  TOR

Interviews conducted by Amy Johnson for AHL Report

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