The Long Road To Recovery - Anthony Stolarz

*I want to be a part of the run. I came here - I want to play games. I want to get in there. I want to play in a home playoff game here with this team. I know it might be a little far-fetched, but at the same time for me this has what  has got me through the last six months. This moment, knowing that there's a chance I could come back."  - Anthony Stolarz, Lehigh Valley Phantoms (February 28th, 2018)

ALLENTOWN - Flash back six months to the week before Philadelphia Flyers training camp, and goaltender Anthony Stolarz was just finishing up all his post-surgery rehabilitation for a torn meniscus he suffered in the opening minutes of last spring's game against the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins just prior to the 2017 Calder Cup Playoffs - what would have marked Stolarz's first-ever playoff hockey at the pro level.

Stolarz recalled being in his car driving the week prior to the beginning of camp, his left leg leaned up against the car door much as you would expect a six-foot, six-inch goaltender to do. He went to move his leg in, and felt "the same thing I felt against Wilkes-Barre - it kind of just locked up on me".

"I was extremely frustrated. Guess you could say pretty depressed when it happened," Stolarz said of re-tearing his meniscus. "Especially a week before training camp. You're getting geared up thinking everything is good to go and you get a setback like that."

Stolarz said he had reached his low-point throughout the process in the four days in September following re-injuring his knee, the time leading up to what would be his second knee surgery in the last six months.

"The didn't know the severity of it - whether my meniscus would have to be taken out or not - until they got in there," he explained. "I got good news, they stitched it back up and it's been a long road. I've worked my ass off the last six months to get back here and try to play games this year."

In hindsight, Stolarz explained that this second meniscus tear could be seen as a blessing in disguise, as it wasn't as violent an injury as the first time it was torn.

"It kind of just happened. If I was playing hockey, or doing something a little more aggressive the tear could have been worse," Stolarz said.

After having the surgery in September, it wasn't until mid-November and into early December that a real possibility of being able to return this season was in the cards for Stolarz. It started with a ramped up exercise routine with more sprinting and jumping, which Stolarz reported no issues or swelling in his knee.

"My goal was to definitely play this year," Stolarz said, mentioning his work in Philadelphia  with the Flyers' director of Sports Medicine Jim McCrossin and assistant athletic trainer Sal Raffa. "Once they said I had a chance of coming back I put my nose to the grindstone and just worked as hard as I could to prepare this moment."

It wasn't until about three or so weeks ago that Stolarz began skating, first just with skates. He recalled when he was coming back from the meniscus tear the first time that there was some issues when he first started skating, but this time was different. There were no issues. He felt pretty good. He began re-gaining confidence that he would be able to bounce back from the last 10 and a half months.

While Monday marked his first day of skating in Allentown, Wednesday was Stolarz's first practice with the team - who was a regular participant in the team's 90-minute session at the PPL Center in preparation for the first of several three-in-three weekends of games coming up on the schedule in the month of March.

"For me, I know I definitely want to stay here, want to play games here and get a rapport with these guys. It's close to playoffs, I want to try to go in there and definitely play games. I didn't come here just to practice. My goal is to hop in there and win this team some games."

Stolarz knows that with tearing his meniscus twice now, that there's always a possibility of re-injury down the road. This time around, he seems pleasantly optimistic with his situation.

"Yeah, it's always a possibility but like I said my meniscus is pretty solid now, Stolarz said, explaining, "It's the fact that it was the cartilage that was around [the meniscus] that was kind of eroded away, and the problem was my meniscus was kind of getting caught on that and catching/locking my knee."

It was a bucket handle tear," Stolarz said, referring to the longitudinal tear that may take the shape of a bucket handle if displaced. "For me, the biggest thing was the cartilage - making sure that that grows in and giving that enough time to heal and try to restore itself. Where I'm at now, it looks good."

The fact that he joins the Phantoms now with just 19 games left - one quarter of their 2017-18 regular season schedule remains - with the team in first place in the Atlantic Division only further motivated him to put in the time and hard work to get back into a position to be deemed ready for game action this spring.

"Oh 100%. I want to be a part of the run. I came here - I want to play games. I want to get in there. I want to play in a home playoff game here with this team. I know it might be a little far-fetched, but at the same time for me this has what  has got me through the last six months. This moment, knowing that there's a chance I could come back. I have the utmost confidence in myself that I'm going to be able to go out there and be able to play at the highest level possible. There's a little rust now, but the steps I have taken even from a week to two weeks ago to now, it's night and day," an emotional Stolarz said.

"For me, just getting another week of practice and facing these high-quality shots. Just getting back into a routine, getting that competitiveness back it's a good feeling, and it's only going to help me."