As the Phantoms are working themselves through this long season, each week seems to bring them a new hurdle to face, and this past week has been no different. Coming off of a reasonably sound performance in their home-and-home series with the Bears in the weekend before, the Phantoms set off on their longest road trip of the season to date, heading up to Laval for a one-off game on Wednesday, before traveling back down for a pair of games in Hartford on Friday and Saturday, and closing things out in Bridgeport last night.
This all made for a lot of time spent on the bus, and set them up for an uphill battle against the Rocket — and in many ways, it isn’t all that surprising that they ended up putting together one of their most disjointed looking efforts of the season, putting up just 17 shots across the whole of the game on the way to a 3-0 loss. It was something of a wakeup call for some of the younger players in that lineup, just what’s needed to shake off in order to step up for a big game after so long of a trip to get to that game, but somehow, it wasn’t even their biggest test of the weekend.
That is, the Phantoms were already without Emil Andrae in their lineup in Laval, as he was called up to join the Flyers ahead of that game, but further roster shuffling up at the NHL level had some further fallout for them — the injury to Sean Couturier on Thursday necessitated a call-up of a forward, so the Phantoms lost Jacob Gaucher as well, and while they did get Andrae back, in turn, the turnaround was such that he wasn’t able to get into the lineup for them in Hartford until the final game on Saturday before again being recalled at the beginning of this week — meanwhile they were grazed by their own injury woes, as they lost Dennis Gilbert after an open-ice collision in the second period on Friday. Add into that mix the fact that — lest we forget — this week also saw Samu Tuomaala traded away and a new defenseman in Christian Kyrou (who only arrived to join the team at midnight on Friday, we’re told) was asked to step into this new lineup effectively blind, and the Phantoms found themselves stepping into this weekend with a lineup mix which had been well and thoroughly scrambled.
But with all of that flux they had to work around over the weekend, though, they still managed to salvage the end of the road trip quite nicely, delivering two hard-fought efforts that ended in 4-3 wins overtime, seeing their offense still delivering for them at a high enough rate broadly, but also particularly rising to the occasion when they most needed it to secure those wins.
But the biggest accomplishment for this depleted team came on Wednesday night in the road trip finale in Bridgeport, when the Phantoms managed to jump out to an early lead (this on a big goal by Alex Bump), and despite the Islanders twice stepping up themselves to find tying goals — not to mention a the Phantoms putting themselves in the box nine times — managed to bend without breaking when the situations were the most dire, and remain focused on creating their own offense rather than solely reacting to what the Islanders were trying to do. The result was a pouring on of four goals in the last 12 minutes of the game, putting the game well and truly out of reach for the Islanders, as well as another breakout showing for a new contributor — that is, when it was all said and done, it was a four-point night for Denver Barkey, who stepped up as a major driver of offense for the team, combining his most tenacious forechecking, his ability to hit difficult passing lanes, along with his flashy finishing ability, contributing a clutch effort to the heap of clutch efforts that the Phantoms piled up over this road trip.
All of this has made for some pretty impressive results, allowing the Phantoms to hold on to their position at third in their division standings, hovering just two points out of the top position. But even more critically, it speaks to the strength of the team’s underlying process, their approach to these games, that even with their roster depleted, and even with their A-game not within reach the full time over this last week, that they were able to keep rolling so well. Each night, it seemed to be a new player or line stepping up to drive the bus for them, a testament to the maturity of the team, and the depth that they’ve been able to assemble, that it still works even when truly tested. There’s still a good bit of fine tuning that the Phantoms will have to do in their process as the season goes on and even more elements are added into it, but this level of resilience is exactly what you hope to see from a young team led by a first-year head coach, all trying to find their bearings in this league.
Now, with Sam Ersson officially activated from IR and fully available to the Flyers again, a corresponding move to send Gaucher back down was made, and one imagines that Aleksei Kolosov won’t be far behind, so the Phantoms will get a bit in the way of reinforcements as they head into tomorrow’s return home and matchup against the Marlies, on their longest winning streak of the season and looking to keep their momentum building a while longer. They’re coming out of their most challenging stretch of the season to date, but it won’t be the only one that they face over this long season. That they were still able to bank some wins is major, but so too is the invaluable experience that they’ve added more or less right from the hop. The Phantoms have gotten a crash course in what it takes to win in this league, both when your lineup is stocked and when it’s cobbled together from whatever pieces remain, and it’s going to be a meaningful bit of experience to keep held in the back pocket, for when the months go on and the stakes rise even further.
