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Marlies win overtime thriller to take 2-0 lead on Lehigh Valley

May 20, 2018, 8:27 PM ET [75 Comments]
Mike Augello
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The Toronto Marlies have been resilient in this year’s Calder Cup Playoffs, having been pushed to the brink of elimination in the first round and overcoming the team that eliminated them last season in the second round.

Toronto fell behind twice in Game 2 of the Calder Cup Eastern Conference Final, but prevailed 3-2 over the Lehigh Valley Phantoms thanks to a goal from Miro Aaltonen at 10:59 of the extra frame.

Trevor Moore and Carl Grundstrom also scored and Garret Sparks made 35 saves for Toronto, who have won seven straight playoff games in a row and have won all seven games at Ricoh Coliseum.




Aaltonen scored twice in the Marlies victory in Game 1 and along with linemates Grundstrom and Andreas Johnsson have made up Toronto’s most potent offensive unit.

“You are never going to hear anyone on this team belittle the efforts of Miro Aaltonen.” Sparks said after the game. “He’s not a flashy player by any means, (but) he does highly skilled things at great rates of speed and they seem second nature to him.”

The Marlies recent trend of getting off to a quick start was thwarted by the Phantoms, who got on the board first with Mark Friedman’s second goal of the playoffs. Lehigh Valley relied heavily on goalie Alex Lyon, who faced 20 shots in the opening period, mostly due to three Toronto power plays.

With Travis Sanheim in the box for barreling into Garret Sparks, Moore tipped a Calle Rosen point shot to tie the game. The goal was given to Ben Smith, but later changed to Moore, who leads the Marlies with 11 points.




After a scoreless middle frame, the Phantoms took the lead early in the third, as a turnover created by interference on defenseman Travis Dermott was taken advantage of by Phantoms forward Mikhail Vorobyev for his first of the postseason.

Toronto responded just 23 seconds later with the tying goal on a two-on-one break, as Grundstrom used the other Marlies forward as a decoy and snapped a quick wrist shot to the top corner over Lyon’s left shoulder.




Toronto received a couple scares in sudden death. The Phantoms thought they had scored the game winner on a shot that went high above the net but Frederik Gauthier’s stick hit the mesh behind Sparks and the play was carefully reviewed by the officials on a TV monitor in the penalty box before being waived off.

Later in the extra frame, rookie Timothy Liljegren was caught up ice and that error caused a two-on-one counterattack. Dermott hustled back and dove to break up the Phantoms scoring chance and Sparks made a spectacular glove save to prevent the game-winner moments before Aaltonen’s game winner.




“It was a big hockey game for us today.” Marlies coach Sheldon Keefe said. “We win the game yesterday and that’s really good, but if you are (Lehigh Valley), you come in here and get a split and go home for three (games), so today was a big (win) for us. I’m happy we found a way to get on the right side of it.”

Toronto will travel to Allentown following the game, but the series takes a short break before resuming on Wednesday for Game 3, Friday for Game 4 and Saturday for Game 5 if necessary.

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