The Phantoms wrapped up a four-game road trip this weekend with a pair of games in New England, facing off against divisional rivals in Springfield and Providence. It was a mixed bag as far as the results go, as they split the weekend with a win and a loss and saw their points streak brought to an end at seven games, but despite it ending on a note of disappointment, the greater tone as they return him again is one of encouragement.
And, as they approach the halfway point of the season, even with some of the bumps in the road they’ve faced, the pieces are coming together for them in a meaningful way, and they’re tapping back in to that rapid upward trajectory.
Tomasino’s presence a boost
That coming together of the pieces is unfolding in amorphous sense, but indeed also in a pretty literal way. That is, with the addition of Phil Tomasino into the mix up front, the Phantoms have gotten a bit more in the way of reinforcements at the center position, and as much as his immediate high level of play has been a boost to them — his pace has been notable and he’s been able to create already a handful of dangerous scoring chances — just as valuable has been the flexibility to try some new arrangements of their forwards that he’s afforded them.
Over the last three games, the Phantoms have been rolling with a new arrangement for their top two forward lines, as Tomasino keeps things locked down on the second line with Anthony Richard and Cooper Marody on his wings, while Dorwart has been shuffled off of that role and up onto the top line left wing alongside Lane Pederson and Tucker Robertson. And while it’s still early in this new arrangement, it’s showing some pretty immediate promise — Tomasino’s been finding some nice chemistry with his linemates and they’ve been able to generate some good looks, both on the rush and on the cycle alike, while Dorwart, who really seemed to be struggling over these last few weeks, has seen his game wake up really well again, playing in a role that demands less of him defensively and allows him get back to basics as far as his focus on playmaking is concerned. It’s been a somewhat underrated wrinkle, but it feeds nicely this next man up mentality that the team has been preaching — the players have to do their part to rise to this occasion, sure, but the coaching staff finding ways to put them in the best position to do that goes a long way as well.
Injuries beginning to pile up
It seems that the injury bug has not just contained its work to the Flyers, but rather made itself into something of an organizational problem. The Phantoms found themselves without two key players this weekend, as Alex Bump’s upper body injury seems to have flared back up, and his unavailability to the team stretched to three games after he got back into the lineup for one game last weekend, while they also lost Ty Murchison early in the third period on Saturday as he seemed to take an injury to the upper body after being wrestled to the ice in the aftermath of a fight, and he too remained unavailable in the road trip finale on Sunday.
Now, the team’s depth has ensured that they’ve been able to keep things rolling well enough without these two in the mix, but if either of them are looking like they’re going to be out longer term, the absences will surely be felt a bit more pointedly, so that’s a situation worth keeping an eye on.
Goaltending stumbles
On the goaltending side, this weekend was a bit of a mixed bag for the Phantoms. They got another quite solid showing from Carson Bjarnason in Springfield, stopping 14 of 16 shots on the way to the win, but saw things break down on them a bit more on Sunday in Providence. Aleksei Kolosov did face a more difficult assignment in that game — against a team with a bit more firepower and in a game where they did put more shots on him, with 22 in total — but despite coming into this game on a three-game winning streak and with some positive momentum building up, it became pretty quickly apparent that he didn’t have his best stuff.
The Phantoms did some good work in front of him, limiting the number of chances that were getting through to him with some big blocks and some well-placed sticks in lanes, and making it difficult for them to get shooting opportunities from the more dangerous areas of the ice, but Kolosov seemed to be having more trouble than usual picking up the shots that were getting through to him, and despite all of that quickness he brings, his timing in getting square to shots was just a little bit off. It’s a showing he can respond from when eventually back in action this week, but it was some tough timing as well, as it came in what appeared to be otherwise a quite winnable game for the team.
Playing to win
In spite of some of the challenges that the Phantoms have found themselves facing of late, they’re still putting together quite a solid level of play on the collective level. The loss in Providence was undoubtedly a disappointing one, for the fact that at least a push into overtime was within reach, as well as that it saw their season-long points streak ended at seven games. All the same, after a difficult stretch through much of December, it seems that the Phantoms are turning a corner and really getting back to finding their game.
The performance in Springfield was a particular standout. Despite falling behind to begin with, they managed to score two huge goals early in the third period to tie things up in the third period. And while they had the chance to more or less cruise into overtime (as the Thunderbirds seemed to be trying to do), to take one point and rest on the expectation that the combined strength of their goaltending and momentum from their skaters would deliver them a positive result there, they instead took a more aggressive approach and continued to pour on the shots, putting the Thunderbirds well on their heels, and ultimately getting themselves the game winning goal with under 12 seconds remaining in regulation.
All in all, what’s coming clearly into focus is that fact that the underlying process is really beginning to settle in for the Phantoms, and they’re finding ways to even out the level of effort and execution alike that they’re delivering on a game over game basis. It’s a process which is still ongoing, and they haven’t reached perfection yet, but it’s a positive track that they’ve gotten themselves on, and it bodes well for their success down the stretch. There’s a major opportunity in front of them as they head into this back half of the month, with seven more games on the schedule, including six against divisional opponents and teams who are (as of now) sitting below them in the standings, to continue to make some real headway in their climb up those standings. The upper echelon is suddenly looking within grabbing distance, so long as they can keep their foot on the gas.
