Scott Gordon, Phantoms Players' Reflect on AHL Season Cancellation and Team's 2019-20 Season

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Lehigh Valley Phantoms head coach Scott Gordon, along with goaltender Alex Lyon, defenseman Mark Friedman and forwards Morgan Frost and Isaac Ratcliffe spoke with InsideAHLHockey.com via a Zoom conference call Tuesday afternoon to discuss their reaction to the cancellation of the remainder of the American Hockey Leauge (AHL) 2019-20 season as well as their general thoughts on the Phantoms' 2019-20 season.

"I think the season is secondary to what's going on around the world," the Phantoms' head coach said of the coronavirus pandemic shutting down the remainder of the AHL season. "Obviously it's disappointing we didn't get to finish the year and certainly disappointing that we weren't making the playoffs. But that's what is important."

As far as the Phantoms' season, Gordon admitted this past season had been one of the more difficult years he's had as a head coach due to the amount of and frequency of injuries and call ups that plagued the team from basically the onset - beginning with the loss of Nolan Patrick before the season began, and later the departure of Oskar Lindblom.

"Some time in December and January, we had over 11 players out due to call-ups and our injuries," Gordon explained. "With the numbers we had lost players on, never really got to get a full lineup together and that started back in October."

The lack of continuity that ensued, with the frequent rotation of players between the AHL and NHL, certainly made Gordon's job more difficult.

It also allowed several rookie forwards - like Maksim Sushko and Isaac Ratcliffe, for example - to take on much larger roles than initially expected.

"The one benefit to [all the injuries/call ups] was that there were a lot of players that got expanded opportunity and roles that maybe they wouldn't have gotten had that not happened," Gordon told InsideAHLHockey.com. "I'm hoping the benefit of that [will be that] our team will have that much more continuity next year because now, all of a sudden these players - with the expanded roles - will be able to jump into it with a little more contribution than what we got [this season]."

For Ratcliffe, he views the cancellation of the rest of the AHL season as a missed opportunity for further development.

"It's obviously unfortunate that we didn't get to finish off the season," Ratcliffe said Tuesday, admitting,  "I know it wasn't a strong year for us, but obviously to play a full season my first pro year would have been ideal. But it's obviously different than any other year."

Fellow first-year forward Morgan Frost echoed Ratcliffe's sentiments.

"Obviously, the season didn't really go the way we wanted to," Frost said, following that up with the fact that he still had a lot of fun and it was enjoyable to be at the rink. "It's disappointing to have the season cut short, but in general I think it was a good season for me and I learned a lot."

As a goaltender, Alex Lyon didn't overstate the importance - to him personally - the final games of the season bring regardless of being in a postseason race or not.

"I think those last 10-15 games, for me, are extremely important to end the season on the right note," Lyon said. "So I guess a little bit of emptiness in regards to that."

In terms of his views of the Phantoms' 2019-20 season, Lyon mirrored his teammates thoughts of hoping things would have turned out better.

"But, it's a learning process," Lyon explained. "We just have to try and learn from it and move on the best we can."

Mark Friedman, meanwhile, is taking a more practical approach to the cancellation of the AHL season and using this time of uncertainty to stay ready in case he's called upon as part of an extended NHL roster if/when the NHL's season/postseason is resumed.

"Obviously it's a bummer that the [AHL] season ended, but there's nothing we could really do about it," Friedman said. "Just have to do your part to try to stay in shape the best you can and hopefully hockey starts up soon."