Playing Catchup: Phantoms Weekly Reports 9, 10, 11, 12

I've been somewhat under the weather lately, and not posting much on here OR on my personal blog. But now I'm doing better, so my goal is to get back up to speed ASAP and just pick up posting from there.

So to get everyone caught up to how things have been going, let me get up-to-date on the Phantoms Weekly Reports on the Phantoms site.

Phantoms Weekly Report #9

Phantoms Weekly Report #10

Phantoms Weekly Report #11

Phantoms Weekly Report #12

In other news, the Phantoms drew 13,127 for their game at the Wachovia Center. It was great to see our players in person, rather than on a computer screen, and it was doubly great to be able to do so among the many fellow fans I spent so many years attending games with. I got to chat with a lot of people whom I hadn't seen since last April, when the final pro hockey game was played in the Spectrum. We even had our own announcer, as the Trenton Devils let Keith Jones come down to Philly to announce the game. The Phantoms made a good showing, and the only thing lacking from that night was a win. We lost a hard-fought game 2-1 in OT to Norfolk.

We have had some significant roster changes in the past few days. Among them: Johan Backlund, who'd been called up to the Flyers due to an injury to Ray Emery, was sent back to the Phantoms. Backlund was returned to Glens Falls because Michael Leighton, a former Flyer/Phantom (albeit briefly for both teams), was claimed off waivers to back up Brian Boucher while Emery recovers from abdominal surgery. The day prior to the Flyers' claim of Leighton, they signed goaltender John Grahame to a PTO for the Phantoms. Today, to ease the goalie surplus in Adirondack, Nic Riopel was returned to his junior team.

Meanwhile, other players who've been called up as injury fill-ins and returned include Jared Ross, Andreas Nodl, and David Laliberte. Oskars Bartulis was called up, and played so well that he was signed to a one-way deal with the Flyers. Jonathon Kalinski was also called up, and remains on the Flyers roster.

Danny Syvret, who scored one GWG with 1.6 seconds remaining in OT and another with 0.1(!!!!) seconds remaining in regulation time, was almost called up as an injury fill-in. But he couldn't get to Pittsburgh in time to meet the team, and one of the Flyers' injured D (Coburn) was cleared to play, so Syvret's recall transaction was negated.

There. I think that's pretty much all the news that's fit to print for the time being. GO PHANTOMS!

P.S. One more bit of coverage from the Phantoms' game in Philadelphia... Tim McManus interviewed me and another former Phantoms Season Ticket Holder who have continued to follow the team after the move to Glens Falls. Read the article HERE.