43
Phantoms expect challenge from Lumberjacks
Photo
Phantoms coach Anthony Noreen on Monday said he is planning on switching up goalie duties in the playoffs between Colin DeAugustine (31), who played in Saturday’s game against Team USA, and Chris Birdsall.
The Lumberjacks have won 35 of their 60 games
By Tom Williams
YOUNGSTOWN
The USHL regular-season champion Youngstown Phantoms have nothing but respect for their first-round opponent in the USHL playoffs.
The Phantoms will open a best-of-five series Wednesday in Muskegon, Mich., against the fourth-place Lumberjacks (35-21-4, 74 points).
“Winning 35 games is not easy to do, they are an excellent team,” Phantoms head coach Anthony Noreen said Monday.
During the regular season, the Phantoms (40-14-6, 86 points) went 4-1-1 against the Lumberjacks.
“We expect them to come out hard,” co-captain Ryan Lomberg said. “We’re excited to open it up on the road. It’s a challenge to play in front of another team’s fans, but we welcome the challenge.
“We’re absolutely excited to play in front of a good crowd. We’re also excited to go on the road and play in front of a pretty quiet building because we’re going to make it that way.”
Like the other four higher seeds in the first round, the Phantoms chose a 1-2-1-1 format with a road game to open the series and the second and third games at home this weekend.
“It wouldn’t have been surprising if one of two would have done [the traditional 2-2-1],” Noreen said. “Obviously the advantage is having the home weekend dates. Hopefully get more people in the building to support us, let more people in Youngstown see playoff hockey.”
Noreen said the Phantoms will have their hands full.
“Eric Schierhorn is probably the best goaltender in the league, so he’s always going to give them a chance,” Noreen said of the Lumberjacks’ top goalie. “We’ve got to get traffic at him. We’ve done that in the past and had some success.”
Other concerns are the Lumberjacks’ power-play unit and their size.
“They have an excellent power-play [unit], one of the few in the league with a higher percentage than ours,” Noreen said. “They are big and they are heavy, a big forward group that will wear on you.”
Noreen said he intends to rotate goaltenders Colin DeAugustine and Chris Birdsall.
“For the time being, we’re going to stick with what’s been working and that’s [using] both goalies.”
Birdsall was named the USHL’s goalie of the week Monday while center and scoring champion Kyle Connor was named one of the forwards of the week.