Phantoms Lineup

Andy Andreoff – Cal O’Reilly – Nicolas Aube-Kubel

Mikhail Vorobyev – German Rubtsov – Maksim Sushko

Greg Carey – Kyle Criscuolo – Isaac Ratcliffe

Matthew Strome – Gerry Fitzgerald – Kurtis Gabriel

Tyler Wotherspoon – James de Haas

Chirs Bigras – Mark Friedman

T.J. Brennan – Nate Prosser

J-F Berube – Kirill Ustimenko

Scratches

Brett Supinski, David Kase, Pascal Laberge, Eric Knodel, Jeremy Beaudry, Reece Willcox, Felix Sandstrom

Injuries

Morgan Frost (lower body)

Game Report

After opening the preseason on the road Wednesday night against the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, and winning that game, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms took to their home ice at the PPL Center on Sunday afternoon for a second matchup against their northern rival.

Overall, the game was pretty uneventful, particularly for the opening 10 minutes. Then both teams combined for seven penalties in the second half of the first period, putting each bench’s special teams units into plenty of action.

With both teams only getting a handful of shots on goal in the first 20 minutes, it seemed as if they were destined to head to first intermission still scoreless, but Lehigh Valley newcomer Andy Andreoff tipped in a point shot from Greg Carey on a power play with just 36 seconds left on the clock to put the Phantoms ahead 1-0.

The second period came alive, if you like chirping, and scrums, and pushing and shoving. No one actually dropped the gloves, but these division rivals certainly made sure to reignite their continued tensions after each whistle and game stoppage.

It would come down to the third period to make or break these teams. About a minute into the frame Nicolas Aube-Kubel teed up a big one-timer from the circle to put the Phantoms up 2-0 over the Penguins. Andreoff was awarded an assist on goal, giving him a multi-point night in his Lehigh Valley debut.

Both teams continued to exchange penalties throughout the period, but the home penalty killers kept the puck away from J-F Berube in the Phantoms net. Then the Penguins finally found their way through to the back of the net when David Warsofsky shot the puck wide, bouncing it off the end boards to Ryan Haggerty who buried his shot from a sharp angle.

Less than a minute later, however, Mikhail Vorobyev found the puck on his stick during a power play and his shot found its way through traffic and into the Penguins net to restore Lehigh Valley’s two-goal lead. The 3-1 score put the game out of reach of Wilkes-Barre/Scranton and gave the Phantoms back-to-back wins.

The Phantoms play one more preseason game on Monday night when the Hershey Bears visit Allentown.

After the game, we spoke to Aube-Kubel, Andreoff, Berube, and Kurtis Gabriel, in addition to head coach Scott Gordon. Listen to full audio in the player below.

Plus / Minus

▲  Andy Andreoff, T.J. Brennan, Nicolas Aube-Kubel

▼  Kyle Criscuolo, Maksim Sushko