GAMEDAY: Game 6 - Lehigh Valley (3-2-0) at Bridgeport (2-3-1) 3:00 p.m. ET
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BRIDGEPORT - The Lehigh Valley Phantoms (3-2-0) look to finish off their first three-game weekend of the season on a positive note when they take on the Bridgeport Sound Tigers (2-3-1) at the Webster Bank Arena Sunday afternoon.
Full recap + latest news/notes from last night's game -> http://insideahlhockey.com/article/gameday-game-5-lehigh-valley-2-2-0-at-w-bscranton-4-1-0-705-pm-et
Lehigh Valley Phantoms Roster Notes
With Carter Hart starting Friday night (Alex Lyon was the backup) & Lyon starting Saturday (Anthony Stolarz was the backup), it would appear Stolarz is in line to get the start today if I did my math right using the transitive property. It'll be interesting to see how this three-goalie platoon works for the Phantoms.
EDIT: Carter Hart led the Phantoms onto the ice for warmups.
James de Haas, Radel Fazleev and Connor Bunnaman returned to the Phantoms' lineup Saturday after sitting out Friday night as a healthy scratch. Reece Willcox, Colin McDonald and David Kase sat out to make room Saturday.
Today, Fazleev and de Haas returned to healthy scratches and Chris Conner was out of the lineup as well. In for them today? David Kase, Colin McDonald and Reece Willcox
Lehigh Valley Lines (Starters in Bold/Italics):
Greg Carey - Phil Varone - Nicolas Aube-Kubel Carsen Twarynski - Mike Vecchione - David Kase Taylor Leier - German Rubtsov - Colin McDonald (C) Tyrell Goulbourne - Connor Bunnaman - Cole Bardreau
T.J. Brennan (A) - Philip Samuelsson Zach Palmquist - Phil Myers Mark Friedman - Reece Willcox
Carter Hart - Anthony Stolarz
Phantoms' Scratches: Alex Lyon (healthy), James de Haas (healthy), David Drake (healthy), Radel Fazleev (healthy) and Chris Conner (healthy)
Bridgeport Sound Tigers Roster Notes
With help from Sound Tigers' reporter Michael Fornabaio.
Chris Bourque - Tanner Fritz - Steve Bernier (A) Michael Dal Colle - Travis St. Denis - Mike Sislo Kieffer Bellows - Ryan Hitchcock - Joshua Ho-Sang Connor Jones - Jeff Kubiak - Ben Holmstrom (C)
Devin Toews - Kyle Burroughs Seth Helgeson (A) - Mitch Vande Sompel Parker Wotherspoon - Sebastian Aho
Sound Tigers' Scratches: Chris Casto, Yannick Rathgeb, Ryan Bourque, Otto Koivula, Stephen Gionta, Scott Eansor and Matt Gaudreau
GAME STORY
FIRST PERIOD
The Phantoms got an early power play chance, and made the most of it to take an early 1-0 lead.
German Rubtsov continued his strong performance on the weekend, with some good work behind the Bridgeport net halfway through the power play before flipping one in front for David Kase for Kase's second goal of the season.
Bridgeport got a power play of their own at the 5:45 mark and had some solid offensive zone time and puck distribution, but Carter Hart was in position and tracked the puck well during the Phantoms' first PK on the afternoon. After some shaky saves in the opening minutes, he stood tall and helped Lehigh Valley kill off Carsen Twarynski's tripping minor.
Mark Friedman drew the Phantoms a late first period power play, and the man advantage unit made it a perfect 2-for-2 before the opening stanza came to a close.
T.J. Brennan got a puck to the left-wing wall for Greg Carey, and while the hard-shooting forward is well known to be "the shooter" on the power play he fooled everyone when he sent a perfect pass to the net-front for Phil Varone for an easy tap-in goal past Sound Tigers' goalie Christopher Gibson. Varone's third of the season extended the lead to 2-0 with 48.9 seconds left before the first intermission.
More on Hart from that 1st period:
You can notice a difference in just how dialed in he was early. After being pulled in his 2nd AHL start and allowing five goals his last time out on Friday night, you can bet he was glad to get back in on Sunday and not have to wait another week for a chance at redemption.
Rebound control and puck-tracking amidst traffic were areas he struggled with Friday, but through the opening 20 minutes he was much-improved - especially with the latter of the two.
SECOND PERIOD
Despite just managing three shots on goal in the first period, the Phantoms found the back of the net twice to take their 2-0 lead to the middle frame. They got more pucks through in the second period - 13 shots on net to be exact - but Gibson was equal to the task on all of them to keep his team in the game.
At the other end, Hart was just okay in the period - giving up a bit of a soft goal to Devon Toews near the midway mark of regulation to allow Bridgeport to draw within a goal with 9:57 left.
Toews took a pass from Ben Holmstrom at the Sound Tigers' offensive zone blue line and turned on the jets down the left wing before firing a shot from the top of the circle that eluded Hart - going under his right arm.
The Phantoms began to get into penalty trouble in the second half of the period, and that's when Bridgeport cashed in to tie the game up at 2-2.
Josh Ho-Sang pulled up at the left-wing face-off dot and attempted a cross-ice pass, but it was blocked down by a Phantoms' defender. Unfortunately for Lehigh Valley, Steve Bernier was in position and corralled the loose puck into the net with Hart caught sliding from his right to left anticipating that cross-ice pass.
THIRD PERIOD
Quite the sequence to begin the third period.
Bridgeport got possession and entered the Phantoms' defensive zone in what would become a three (!) minute and 15 second long shift.
With the Phantoms hemmed in their own zone, it was up to Hart to keep the game even at 2-2 and that's exactly what he did - making five saves on that sequence.
It seemed the two teams would play for overtime until a clean face-off win by Travis St. Denis in the Phantoms' defensive zone spelled trouble for Lehigh Valley. Denis won the puck back to Kieffer Bellows for a point shot that Steve Bernier tipped past Hart with 2:45 left to give Bridgeport their first lead of the game.
But the Phantoms didn't fade away quietly into the night.
In fact, on the next shift Kase worked a puck around the perimeter down low and got it up top to Philip Samuelsson who sent one across for a one-time blast by T.J. Brennan that eluded everything and everyone to tie the game back up at 3-3 and force overtime.
OVERTIME
The Phantoms had a glorious chance in overtime to get the second point, getting a power play 1:03 into the extra session, They had plenty of chances (they recorded eight shots in OT) but were unable to find a game-winner, so it was on to the shootout where all three Phantoms shooters - Taylor Leier, German Rubtsov and David Kase - missed the net and Chris Bourque scored on Carter Hart to give Bridgeport the win.
GAME SUMMARY
1st Period
1:52: BST - (PP) Burroughs, minor (roughing) 2:53: LV - PPG Kase (2) - Rubtsov, Varone 5:45: LV - (PP) Twarynski, minor (tripping) 18:34: BST - (PP) Ho-Sang, minor (interference) 19:11: LV - PPG Varone (3) - Carey, Brennan
2nd Period
1:32: BST - (PP) Burroughs, minor (high-sticking) 10:03: BST - Toews (1) - Holmstrom, Hitchcock 11:30: LV - (PP) Brennan, minor (tripping) 13:55: LV - (PP) Vecchione, minor (cross-checking) 15:53: BST - PPG Bernier (3) - Ho-Sang, St. Denis
3rd Period
7:29: BST - (PP) Jones, minor (high-sticking) 17:15: BST - Bernier (4) - Bellows, St. Denis 17:53: LV - Brennan (3) - Samuelsson, Kase
Overtime
1:03: BST - (PP) Bourque, minor (slashing)
Shootout
LV
Leier - no goal Rubtsov - no goal Kase - no goal
BST
C. Bourque - goal Vande Sompel - no goal
BOXSCORE
Lehigh Valley 2 - 0 - 1 - 0 - 0 = 3 Bridgeport 0 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 1 = 4
Shots
Lehigh Valley 3 - 13 - 8 - 8 - 0 = 32 Bridgeport 7 - 11 - 8 - 2 - 1 = 28
Goalies
LV: Carter Hart (25 saves - 28 shots) BST: Christopher Gibson (29 saves - 32 shots)
Power Play
LV: 2-for-5 BST: 1-for-3
Penalty Kill
LV: 2-for-3 BST: 3-for-5
Attendance: 3,888
