Phantoms Fail to Protect Lead, Fall to Manchester
There is nowhere to go but up for the Adirondack Phantoms. Last night's 3-2 home loss to the Manchester Monarchs was the team's seventh loss in its last eight games (1-6-1). As a result, the Phantoms have the fewest points (21) and most regulation losses (14, tied with San Antonio) of any team in the AHL.
Playing without either of their top two defensemen or their captain, the Phantoms were like a rudderless ship at key junctures of last night's game. The effort was there -- unlike Friday night's half-hearted shutout loss to Syracuse -- but the results were not.
Neither
Brayden Schenn nor
Sean Couturier have consistently played well of late, and that has made the problem even worse for a team that already over-relies on two players. Last night, some of the supporting cast players stepped up, but the two best players on the team were invisible for too much of the game.
Adirondack was outplayed for two periods -- especially in a turnover laden middle stanza -- but still somehow managed to skate to the locker room with a 2-1 lead at the second intermission. Returning from a long banishment to the scratch sheet,
Mike Testwuide scored a pretty goal off the rush and was initially credited with a second before the scoring was changed to give it to
Tyler Brown on a deflection of a
Matt Konan point shot on the power play.
Rookie goaltender
Cal Heeter (33 saves) gave his team a chance to win, which is all that can be asked. Unfortunately, he was victimized by some breakdowns in front of him. The team was unable to protect its third-period lead, and two unanswered Manchester goals proved to be the difference.
Linden Vey's goal, which opened the scoring in the middle period, came off a coverage mixup near the net. On Slav Voynov's game-winning goal, Brown fell near the blueline and turned the puck over, while Heeter was screened on the shot by one of his teammates and puck deflected off a Phantom. That's just how it goes when a team is scuffling.
The Monarchs' middle goal, which tied the game 2-2 at the 8:01 mark of the third period, was probably one Heeter would like back. He allowed a fat rebound of a long-distance point shot, and defenseman
Cullen Eddy was unable to neutralize Tanner Pearson before the Kings' 2012 first-round pick claimed the puck to score his sixth goal of the season.
The third period collapse ruined what had been a decent effort for the Phantoms. Adirondack came out of the gates with a lot of energy.
Zac Rinaldo, who had his first fighting major of the season on Friday night, picked up his second in the opening minute of last night's game. In an effort to spark his team the night after an ugly loss, Rinaldo engaged in a spirited bout with Richard Clune. Rinaldo now has 80 penalty minutes through his first 24 games of the season.
Another bright spot:
Eric Wellwood played his best game in weeks. He used his speed well and was much more involved and effective in puck battles than he has been in some time. He generated five shots on goal; one off his season high. Unfortunately, the player was unable to convert a scoring chance from point blank range with goaltender Peter Mannino down and out.
After an 0-for-8 performance on the power play on Friday night, the Phantoms' power play efficiency for the season fell to a mediocre 15.4 percent. Last night, Murray simply kept rolling his usual 5-on-5 lines on the team's two power plays. One of them resulted in Brown's goal.
Top-pairing defenseman
Erik Gustafsson missed the game last night. He hobbled off the ice late in Friday's game after blocking a shot in which he took the puck off his foot. The official word is that he suffered a bone bruise and is day-to-day.
Gustafsson's defense partner,
Marc-Andre Bourdon remained sidelined. Although he has not played or practiced in two weeks, the team is still saying his absence is due to "illness" and not injury, without giving any details on the nature of his condition.
Team captain
Ben Holmstrom is out for an extended period of time with a torn ACL. The team has already sorely missed his tone-setting presence and two-way play, but will have to figure out ways to overcome it.
The Phantoms should not have the worst record in the AHL. They have the ability to be more of a middle-of-the-pack team with the NHLers who have been added for the duration of the lockout, in my opinion.
The club actually improved in terms of team defense (exceptionally loose play on Friday aside) from where they were a year ago. Prior to the December slide, the team had drastically reduced its goals against average from the start of the season and had been winning with much more regularity. Even then, however, it was clear this team is thin depthwise both up front and on the blueline.
Nevertheless, there are ways to mitigate lack of depth and to overcome injuries. There is not one player in the Adirondack locker room -- Schenn and Couturier included -- who can look in the mirror right now and say they are doing as much as they can on a game-in and game-out basis this season.
No one is above criticism. Schenn and Couturier have carried the team at times. It also needs to be said that it's a long season, and all players have ups and downs. That's especially true of first-year and second-year pros. But part of the maturation process of a young player is to learn how to avoid letting the down cycles snowball into prolonged slumps.
When the puck isn't going in, players have to simplify their games. Schenn and Couturier have not done that. Instead, both players have been guilty of late of trying to make low-percentage plays.
Schenn has gone pointless in six of the last eight games. He did have one spectacular game among them, and that was the lone game the team has won in its last eight. Couturier has been a down cycle for the last four games after a stretch of carrying the team. He's pointless in his last three games and has made some uncharacteristically sloppy and undisciplined plays.
Of course, this down phase will pass and both players will resume their earlier dominance. Those two players are the least of Murray's concerns. Besides, two players do not make a team. Others need to step up even if Schenn and/or Couturier are not at their best for a few games.
For example, veteran
Matt Ford, who was far and away the Phantoms best player in the second half of last season, got into Terry Murray's doghouse early this season and has done little to get himself back in the coach's good graces. Second-season pro
Jason Akeson had a spectacular game in his first outing after being recalled from Trenton, but has been sporadic since then. Some games, he's weaved playmaking magic. Other games, he's been a total non-factor.
I'm not sure what can be done to substantially improve the patchwork blueline. Even when Gustafsson and Bourdon were healthy, the lack of depth was obvious. Right now, the team needs veteran
Danny Syvret and second-year pro
Brandon Manning to play pretty much all the tough minutes, and both have really struggled, especially in their own end of the ice.
Arguably, the most consistent player on the team this season has been veteran goaltender
Scott Munroe. But he's not a miracle worker, nor is Heeter.
The Phantoms have a few days to attempt to regroup. Starting on Wednesday, they have busy slate of three games before breaking briefly for Christmas. It all starts with a home tilt against St. John's on Wednesday. The team is on the road on Friday to play Syracuse and then travels to play Bridgeport on Saturday.
*************
Titans Fail to Protect Lead, Fall in OT
The Flyers' ECHL affiliate is struggling just as much as the AHL club. The Trenton Titans have gone weeks without winning back-to-back games. They had an opportunity to accomplish that modest feat last night, but were unable to protect a 4-2 lead midway through the third period. Trenton wound up losing 5-4 in overtime to the Elmira Jackals.
Rookie forward
Marcel Noebels continued his December hot streak, opening the scoring for the Titans with his seventh goal of the season. He later added an assist. The German forward has run red hot and ice cold in his first pro season. He opened the year with points in each of the first eight games (2 goals, 7 assists). Then he went pointless in his next nine games. Since then, Noebels has recorded points in six of the last seven matches (5 goals, 6 assists).
Trenton also got tallies from team captain Andy Bohmbach (11th of the season), Stephen Schultz (eighth goal of the season, plus two assists) and Ryan Hayes. Noebels, Bohmback and Schultz are usually the three players who carry the offense for Vince Williams' team. Rookie forward
Matt Mangene registered an assist for the second straight game.
Devils prospect Scott Wedgewood got the start on Saturday night after earning a win over Wheeling the previous evening. He stopped 29 of 34 shots. With the Titans playing for the third consecutive day,
Niko Hovinen is likely to get the call on Sunday.
The Titans trailed 2-1 after the opening period last night but built a 4-2 lead by the midway point of the third period. The team capitalized on a five-minute power play in the second period take the lead on Bohmbach's conversion of a scoring chance created by defenseman
Blake Kessel. The score held at 3-2 until Schultz added an insurance goal at 9:50 of the third period.
That should have been enough offense to win the game. Unfortunately, the Titans were unable to put down the clamps defensively, and goals by Jack Downing and former Phantom Andrew Rowe knotted the score at 4-4 with 3:41 still remaining on the clock. The collapse was complete when Artem Demkov scored his second goal of the game with 1:09 remaining in overtime.
The Titans will now try for a five-point weekend, which would wash away some of the bitter taste of last night's outcome. Today, Orlando pays a visit to the Sun National Bank Center. The opening faceoff is slated for 3:05 p.m.
**************
Kindle users: Please sign up for Flyers Buzz. For more information
click here.
Click below to follow me on Twitter:
Philadelphia Flyers Blogger •NHL.com • 
Join the Discussion:
»