Phantoms reach division finals

With the victory, the Phantoms advanced to the division finals against the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, beginning on the road Thursday.

The Phantoms had needed 101 shots and five overtime periods to best Leighton in Game 5. They couldn't slip one by him in a Game 6 overtime defeat, despite firing 40 shots.

But last night, on the first shot of the game, Stefan Ruzicka went top right-shelf, flipping a wrist shot past the Rats goalie.

"That's a huge goal, for sure," Phantoms coach Craig Berube said. "That team plays very good with the lead, obviously, and so do we."

Defenseman Denis Gauthier said the goal had a calming effect.

"We've been fighting like dogs to get each and every goal," Gauthier said. "To get one in the first minute, it settled our backs so good. Then we could just play our game."

Ryan Potulny sealed the series by scoring with 1 minute, 27 seconds remaining in the game, opting to shoot rather than pass on a three-on-one situation. But with goalie Scott Munroe stopping each of the 30 shots he faced to earn his second shutout in this series, that goal wasn't even needed.

The shutout was just the seventh for a Game 7 in AHL history.

After staring at Leighton for seven games, the Phantoms will welcome a new face between the pipes.

They fired 314 shots on Leighton in the series. The former Flyer stopped 304 of them for an astounding .968 save percentage while collecting two shutouts.

Leighton's performance overshadowed that of Munroe, who finished the series with a 1.57 goals-against average and a .953 save percentage.

"It's kind of a feather in my cap," Munroe said. "All this talk in the series about Leighton. Not taking anything away from him - he kept them in the series, for the most part - but I thought I was playing just as well."

While the Phantoms got quality goaltending and had an 89.1 percent success rate on the penalty kill, they continued to struggle on the power play. The Phantoms scored just three goals on 38 opportunities in the series. They needed a five-minute major to score one of them and failed to record a power-play goal on 14 chances in the final three games.

"It's not from not generating chances," Berube said. "I think the chances are there. I think sometimes when it's not going in, you start forcing it a little too much, moving the puck around and eating the clock up."

The Phantoms set an AHL record for fewest goals scored in a seven-game series, with 11. The previous record was 13, held by several teams. The Rats scored 12.

Left winger Jared Ross led the Phantoms with three goals. He also tied Boyd Kane and Ruzicka for the team lead in points, with four.

Against Leighton, it took plenty of shots to get those points.