GAME STORY: 2019-20 Season - W-B/Scranton at Lehigh Valley 11/6/19

ALLENTOWN, PA --  The Lehigh Valley Phantoms' (4-2-4) busy game schedule continues with a Wednesday night matchup against rival Wilkes-Barre/Scranton (5-4-2).

Lehigh Valley Phantoms Roster Notes

Line rushes in warmup:

Greg Carey - Cal O'Reilly - Nicolas Aube-Kubel Andy Andreoff - Morgan Frost - Isaac Ratcliffe Kurtis Gabriel - German Rubtsov - Maksim Sushko Kyle Criscuolo - Gerry Fitzgerald- David Kase

T.J. Brennan - Andy Welinski Chris Bigras - Nate Prosser Sam Morin - Mark Friedman

J-F Berube - Alex Lyon

GAME STORY

1st Period

It was a bit of a sluggish start for Lehigh Valley in the opening minutes, and they surrendered an early goal to fall behind 1-0 to the Penguins just 2:21 into the contest after Jake Lucchini worked a puck out of a tangle of bodies in the corner and fired a quick shot that beat J-F Berube to the short side top corner.

From there, though, the Phantoms got to their game and spent several shifts with extended offensive zone time.

After Mark Friedman was boarded by Ryan Haggerty, who was challenged to a fight by Phantoms defenseman Nate Prosser, Kyle Criscuolo won an offensive zone face-off back to T.J. Brennan. Brennan quickly fed a pass across to Andy Welinski for a quick one-timer that eluded Penguins' goalie Casey DeSmith - tying the game at 1-1 with 3:59 gone in the first frame. The goal was Welinski's first in a Phantoms' uniform.

Lehigh Valley continued to spend large portions of time in the offensive zone, but were unable to capitalize and find a go-ahead goal - sending the two teams to the first intermission deadlocked at 1-1.

2nd Period

Lehigh Valley took their first lead of the night 2:53 into the middle frame after T.J. Brennan cleared a puck out from the left wing wall in the defensive zone to the far blue line, where Greg Carey picked it up and -- with a power move to the net -- got past the Penguins' defender before firing a shot past DeSmith to put the Phantoms ahead 2-1. The goal marked Carey's third in his last four games played.

The Penguins tied it up less than three minutes later on a breakout play, with T.J. Brennan attempting to steal a puck in the neutral zone that was unsuccessful - forcing Welinski to defend a 2-on-1 that Adam Johnson and Ryan Haggerty ran to perfection, with Haggerty tying the game back up at 2-2 just 5:26 into the middle frame.

Lehigh Valley had a chance to take the lead on a power play chance late in the period but were unable to generate much of anything with the man advantage.

Instead, Carey took matters into his own hands - getting a puck in the neutral zone and stickhandling his way past the Penguins defense and into the offensive zone, later starting a cycle play with Cal O'Reilly and Kyle Criscuolo which ended up with Criscuolo firing a shot past DeSmith from inside the right-wing circle with 1:20 left in the period to put Lehigh Valley ahead 3-2 heading to the third.

3rd Period

Sam Morin came up a little gimpy after a collision down low in the corner of the Phantoms' defensive zone with under six minutes to play in the 2nd period. He was flexing his right leg coming off the ice, reportedly took one more shift in the period but did not finish the game and was not on the bench when the teams began the third.

Meanwhile, the Phantoms needed to kill off near back-to-back penalties in the opening half of the period, and were able to do so with help from the strong play of J-F Berube in net and the penalty killers.

Lehigh Valley had some good chances on a power play of their own in the final five minutes of play, but were unable to extend the lead before the Penguins opted to pull DeSmith for an extra attacker in the final 90 seconds.

After a few missed attempts at the empty net went for icing, Criscuolo was able to hit the empty net to complete the 4-2 final score.

GAME SUMMARY

1st Period

2:21: WBS - Lucchini (3) - unassisted 3:55: LV - Prosser, minor (instigating) 3:55: LV - Prosser, major (fighting) 3:55: LV - Prosser, ten-minute misconduct 3:55: WBS - Haggerty, minor (boarding) 3:55: WBS - Haggerty, major (fighting) 3:59: LV - Welinski (1) - Brennan, Criscuolo 6:44: WBS - (PP) Warsofsky, minor (slashing) 19:28: LV - (PP) Brennan, minor (cross-checking)

2nd Period

2:53: LV - Carey (3) - Brennan 5:26: WBS - Haggerty (2) - Johnson, Blandisi 14:16: WBS - Angello, minor (holding the stick) 18:20: LV - Criscuolo (2) - O'Reilly, Carey

3rd Period

5:26: LV - (PP) Rubtsov, minor (boarding) 8:58: LV - (PP) Carey, minor (slashing) 11:49: WBS - (PP) Agozzino, minor (slashing) 19:35: LV - ENG Criscuolo (3) - Andreoff, O'Reilly

BOXSCORE

W-B/Scranton  1 - 1 - 0 = 2 Lehigh Valley  1 - 2 - 1 = 4

Shots

W-B/Scranton  10 - 8 - 6 = 24 Lehigh Valley  9 - 13 - 9 = 31

Goalies

WBS: Casey DeSmith (27 saves - 30 shots) LV: J-F Berube (22 saves - 24 shots)

Power Play

WBS: 0-for-3 LV: 0-for-3

Penalty Kill

WBS: 3-for-3 LV: 3-for-3