Phantoms @ Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins 12-30-08: First Period

Boy, that's not the way we wanted to start this game. We gave up a goal in the first three minutes. It's the fifrth consecutive game that our opponents scored first.

Oh, right, I'd forgotten that in Wilkes-Barre, the announcer gives a falsetto "Woo!" after announcing a Penguins goal. Boy, if THAT isn't incentive to play solid defense, I don't know what is!

Munroe is in goal for the Phantoms. I have to say, I'm surprised that Aubin wasn't given one of these two road games. If Paddock doesn't opt to play him during our home game on Friday, goodness knows we have a long road trip coming up to let Aubin get his feet back under him. He hasn't played since injuring himself on the night after Thanksgiving.

Speaking of injuries, we still have Guenin, Beaulieu, and Hersley injured.

Ah, we are about to get a PP. I see Ross, Sirianni, Nodl, and Syvret on the ice. DeSantis is our other defenseman, though he wasn't on camera when we first took the faceoff. Nice, we look so much more effective at the start of this PP than we did in the last game or two. Even when we're not shooting on net, we are actually cycling the puck without having it repeatedly picked off and cleared. The PP is over now, and while we didn't score, we didn't look like we were running around disorganized, either. I'll take it.

It didn't take an especially long time before the Phantoms were granted another man advantage. We have spent the past two minutes pressuring the Penguins but without evening the score. However, spending all that time in the other team's end is a definite move in the right direction.

Oh, and here we go -- Ciamaga has decided that Raduns tripped someone so our PK is about to get a workout. Unfortunately, the Penguins are creating a major scrum in front of our net. There were too many shots, rebounds, and deflections for our guys to handle. The end result: 2-0 Bad Guys.

Boogaard is fighting Clackson in the final minute of the period. They were wrestling with each other when Clackson lost his footing and fell, so the fight didn't last long. Boogaard is about to get an extra two minutes -- in fact, he's got the Bettman 17 (2 for Instigation, 5 for fighting, 10-minute misconduct). Therefore, the Phantoms will go on the PP with 10.2 seconds remaining in the period.

At the end of the period, the score is 2-0, Penguins.