State of the Phantoms 2018-19
ALLENTOWN - The Lehigh Valley Phantoms' game schedule is rapidly approaching as the preseason opener in Wilkes-Barre against the rival Penguins is scheduled for Thursday night at the Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza.
Regardless of whether you're the glass half-full or half-empty type, last season's success - a playoff run to the conference finals round - are now in the rear view mirror and a new season with new situations, hardships, injuries and call ups await.
The need to continue building and maintaining a winning culture and positive environment for prospect development has this year's Phantoms team - a largely returning team with little turnover - still looking to reach new heights entering 2018-19.
Making the postseason is now beginning to trend toward the norm for Phantoms hockey as the team has earned a berth in the Calder Cup Playoffs each of the last two seasons, now entering their fifth season in the Lehigh Valley.
Some quick hits before the first unofficial media availability opportunity for Inside AHL Hockey this season coincides with the final practice before the team begins their three-game preseason slate.
Chemistry
The amount of roster turnover in the AHL is usually pretty significant from one season to the next. Younger players are looking to push for NHL jobs, veterans on one-year deals are rapidly changing teams looking for the best path to the NHL. The Phantoms have lost some key players from last spring's playoff run - Travis Sanheim and Oskar Lindblom are NHL locks with the Flyers this season while guys like Mikhail Vorobyev, Phil Myers and Corban Knight are making strong cases to begin the year in the NHL.
In all, when the Phantoms begin their regular season on October 6th at home against Bridgeport it will be as many as 14 returning skaters (if you include Vorobyev and Knight) as well as potentially some familiar faces in net in Anthony Stolarz and/or incoming rookie Carter Hart.
"Not so much that we have to take advantage of it, but it's definitely an advantage," head coach Scott Gordon said prior to AHL training camp about the team returning so many players from last year's squad. "Even just doing a drill out here [in NHL camp in Voorhees], and Tyrell goes 'hey that's an Allentown special right there'. It's good when players know your drills so that you can start to work on the finer things and as a result, hopefully, that allows you to build on the previous year."
While it certainly helps having a largely similar group of players return, it's not the sole focus for the Phantoms entering the season.
"When it's all said and done we have to look at our team and figure out ways we can get better," Gordon said. "It's not necessarily making wholesale changes as it is everybody doing a little bit more than what they did last year as a group and then the team will be exponentially better. That's the way we are approaching this year, getting better in smaller areas [of the game]."
Phantoms' captain Colin McDonald acknowledged the chemistry bonus. Sort of.
"Just because it all sounds great talking about it, we gotta make sure we use that to our advantage. Not every team has that luxury."
McDonald took it one step further, saying that while it's nice to have a lot of the same teammates as last season, that the attitude can't be centered around the fact that this team had success last season and it will have any kind of carry-over effect.
"As cliche as it sounds, last season is behind us. You know how tough our division is and the free agency [additions on a lot of the teams], it's not going to be an easy division."
Development
There's a fine line between giving younger players a large enough role at the AHL level and balancing it with veteran AHL-proven commodities to give a winning environment while also and informative one for developing players to grow their games.
It's also something that Gordon talked about with Inside AHL Hockey earlier this month.
"Everyone's development is different. There's no charted path that each player takes that's going to be the same. Whether it's someone like Nic (Aube-Kubel) who really struggled his first year and then what he did for three quarters of the season was more than anyone expected. Myers and Friedman coming in. Different backgrounds, circumstances, age, ability. To get to the point where Phil is playing against other team's top lines, playing power play and penalty kill and then Mark just even from the start of the year almost being a 6,7,8 defenseman and not playing a lot of minutes and by the end of the year he's playing as a regular in the playoffs like every other defenseman. To be able to see that, that's a huge thing."
"Like I said, everyone's path is different and we're encouraged by what everyone did this year, but there's certainly more that we want to continue to work on and continue to get better at."
Veterans
Good 'vets' are hard to find.
AHL teams need veteran players not only for their experience on the ice but off the ice as well. It's important to have the right guys setting and instilling the right habits into these team's highly-touted prospects. Luckily for Lehigh Valley, they have quite a few good ones according to Gordon.
"I think we have a core group, especially with Mac, Chris, TJ - they know where they are in their careers. They want to be part of a good organization and a team that's having success," the Phantoms' head coach said, adding, "That's something that at a lot of times gets lost on some vets - they're just more concerned about their own playing careers and moving on to the next place the next year. We've been lucky that way finding guys not only on the ice but in the locker room. It's always important to have the right guys coming in because it sets the tone - be it at practice, the room - there's some intangibles that those guys can bring that make the process of development better."
It's a two-way street for those veteran players as well.
"Guys are willing to sign multi-year deals here knowing that even if they are in the minors that they're in a really good spot," McDonald said of the draw for playing in the organization.
Remember, the AHL's veteran rule only allows a maximum of five veterans (players who begin the season with more than 320 pro games of experience) to be dressed in the lineup and one additional player who has appeared in more than 260 pro games but less than the 320-mark where the player is deemed a veteran.
Here's a list of Phantoms' current 'veteran' players by AHL rule:
T.J. Brennan, Chris Conner, Colin McDonald, Phil Varone
If two of Corban Knight (320 pro games), Jori Lehtera (458 pro games) and Dale Weise (633 pro games) were assigned to Lehigh Valley - it would put the Phantoms at the maximum veterans allowed in the lineup.
The Roster
With a few cuts still remaining in NHL camp in Philadelphia, Gordon has a pretty good idea of what the Lehigh Valley Phantoms roster will look like and it might be a lot more clear prior to their preseason opener in Wilkes-Barre on Thursday night.
Heading into Wednesday morning's practice, here is what the Phantoms have on their AHL roster:
Tryouts (4): defenseman Adam Larkin and Steven Johnson and forwards Shane Walsh and Adam Schmidt
Goaltenders (1): Brenden Komm (AHL-contract)
Defensemen (8): James de Haas (AHL-contract), Frank Hora (AHL-contract), Phil Myers, Zach Palmquist (AHL-contract), David Drake (AHL-conract), Nick Luukko (AHL-contract), T.J. Brennan and Reece Willcox
Forwards (13): Nicolas Aube-Kubel, Cole Bardreau, Greg Carey, Colin McDonald (AHL-contract), German Rubtsov, Radel Fazleev, Mike Vecchione, Chris Conner (AHL-contract), Connor Bunnaman, Phil Varone, Michael Huntebrinker (AHL-contract), Alex Krushelnyski (AHL-contract) and David Kase
