Phantoms’ U-18 AAA team enjoys second season of success

BOARDMAN — The Mahoning Valley Phantoms Midget-Major — or U-18 AAA — hockey team is continuing its success in terms of player development in its second year at the Ice Zone

Founded for the 2007-08 season, the midget-major team competes in the MWEHL Tier 1 Elite Hockey League, consisting of top-level under-18 teams from as far east as Pittsburgh and as far west as Los Angeles.

In less than two seasons, the team has already sent three players to the Phantoms’ Junior “A” team, including defensemen Trevor Shively and Kyle Van and, most recently, forward Cody Ganchar.

Phantoms assistant coach and director of player personnel Curtis Carr says that from a development standpoint, the Phantoms’ U-18 AAA team has been a big hit so far.

“This is only our second year with the midget-major team, and our main goal for them has always been player development,” said Carr. “In addition to Van and Shively moving up this season to play with our junior team, many other players from last year’s national finalist team moved on to play Tier-III Junior ‘A’ in various leagues across the country.

“This year our focus is on skill development and though the [U-18 AAA] team is pretty young, we’ve got some very exciting and very talented prospects on that team who will all move on to solid junior careers.”

Ganchar, who was called up to the Phantoms’ junior club on January 11th, has already registered his first assist and carries a +1 plus/minus rating through three games so far. He says that thanks to the midget-major team, he was ready to step into a productive mid-season role with the Phantoms.

“Midget-major gave me a place to build my confidence and focus on my skills,” said the Cleveland native. “The faster and more highly skilled game at that level really prepared me well to make the move to juniors as seamless as possible.”

The U-18 AAA team, coached by Milo Cermak, is off this weekend; it’ll return to action on Feb 7 when it visits the Pittsburgh Hornets in MWEHL league play. The midget major team is led in scoring by Ty Loney, who has 11 goals and 11 assists on the year.