Flyers Farm Stars: Denver Barkey on a tear, Alexis Gendron hits 20 goals

Another week, another round of prospect watching to recap. Things are slowing down in some areas of the pipeline, with prospects being eliminated from their respective playoff pushes, but the action we still have unfolding has been exciting, to say the least.

The News of the Week

We\'ll get into some more of the news as we go, as far as playoff results are concerned, but first, a couple of notes right off the bat. The Phantoms have gotten some reinforcements added back into their mix -- Olle Lycksell was assigned back to the team yesterday, while Alex Ciernik (who joined them about two weeks ago) finally made his debut this past Saturday against Springfield. And this will all certainly offer a notable boost for them, as they clinched a playoff spot over the weekend, but are still looking to build their game back up, find some momentum, and head into the first round on a high note.

Three Stars

Denver Barkey

The playoffs kicked off up in the OHL last week, and Denver Barkey sure is making a statement through the first round for London. He got off to a hot start over their first two games (which we touched on last week), and he was able to keep that momentum rolling through their next two games. He put up two goals and three assists across those two games, as London completed their sweep of Owen Sound (we\'ll also toss in an early honorable mention nod here, as his teammate Oliver Bonk also got on the board this week, with an assist). The Knights punched their ticket to the second round with ease, and they\'re now set to face off against Erie in a series which will start tomorrow. They\'re going to be hard to slow down, and Barkey is a key reason why.

Heikki Ruohonen

Back in the States, Ruohonen\'s putting together what\'s looking like a really solid end to his regular season. He had just two games on the schedule with Dubuque over the last week, but he put up two goals and an additional assist across that pair of games, extending his points streak to four games (closing in on matching a season high of five games in a row, a mark which he\'s hit twice across the whole season). With just a couple weeks left in the regular season, things are beginning to heat up — Dubuque is just one point out of the lead in their conference — as they head towards the postseason and work to get themselves in the best position to start things off. Ruohonen\'s feeding nicely into those efforts, and putting his all into working towards finishing his tenure in the USHL on a high note.

Alexis Gendron

It\'s been a big week for Gendron, that\'s for sure. Despite some of the struggles in consistency and finding their scoring game on a collective level that the team ran into this week, Gendron was able to keep himself rolling really nicely. He picked up two goals across his three games played, the second of which brought him to the 20 goal mark on the season . This moves him into a tie for the team lead in scoring, but more impressively, marks just the third time since the team relocated to Lehigh Valley that a rookie has managed to hit that level. And with two weeks left in the regular season, Gendron isn\'t content to just rest on his laurels -- he\'s at 20 goals so far, he emphasized after Friday\'s game -- and is rather looking to keep the ball rolling and score some more before the season\'s out, which is something the team certainly needs.

Honorable Mentions

It was a largely quiet week offensively for the Phantoms, but still a handful of prospects got involved in the offense they did generate, alongside Gendron. Both of Ethan Samson and JR Avon chipped in a goal apiece (Samson across all three games played, Avon across two), while Adam Ginning continues to stay involved on the offensive side as well, and came away from his three games played with a pair of assists. Jett Luchanko has also continued to find some nice chemistry playing on that line with Gendron and Garrett Wilson, and he came away with another assist on the week, as he continues to settle in at this level.

Overseas, we\'ve got postseasons unfolding as well, but with some mixed results. Ilya Pautov, with an assist over his last three games as well, found himself eliminated from the MHL playoffs this week. He finishes the season, officially, with 49 points in 58 games played. And then over in the Allsvenskan, Karlskoga\'s series against AIK is still underway, tied at two wins apiece, and Jack Berglund put up one assists as well over those four games.

And finally, we\'ll circle back around to the OHL to wrap this thing up. Bonk and Barkey weren\'t the only prospects to find some offense in their first-round series, as Noah Powell also got involved (albeit in a limited capacity). He played four games in the last week and change, and chipped in an assist over that span. It\'s not as much pop as we\'ve seen from him in his time with Oshawa, but it\'s still something, a contribution to their series win over Brampton in six games. They\'ll move on to the second round as well, and are set to face Brantford later this week.

Talking Points