Frank Powers Bears to 5-1 Game 2 Win Over Phantoms

Ethen Frank led the way with three points and the Hershey Bears (2-0) took a 2-0 series lead in the Atlantic Division Semifinals with a 5-1 win over the Lehigh Valley Phantoms (2-2) in front of a sold-out crowd of 10,520 on Saturday night at GIANT Center. The crowd marked the largest single-game home attendance for a first or second round playoff game for Hershey since Game 2 of the East Division Semifinals against Bridgeport on April 16, 2010 (10,112).

2nd Game, Atlantic Division Semifinals – Hershey Bears vs LV Phantoms. Saturday, May 4, 2024, the Bears beat the Phantoms by a score of 5-1.

BOX SCORE

Frank opened the scoring with his first of the postseason at 4:47 of the first period when the Bears transitioned from defense to offense, as Dylan McIlrath sent a pass out of the Hershey zone to Joe Snively, who sprang Frank for a breakaway, and the winger deked before putting a backhander past Cal Petersen.

Alex Limoges nearly made it 2-0 at 6:21 when he attempted to bury a pass from Ivan Miroshnichenko, but Petersen lunged across his goal line to make a smothering save.

Frank netted another goal at 8:18 from Snively and Priskie to put the Chocolate and White up by a pair.

Hunter McDonald put the Phantoms on the board at 18:45 when he chipped the puck past a screened Hunter Shepard.

Henrik Rybinski made it 3-1 at 4:48 of the second period when he deflected Bogdan Trineyev’s shot from the left circle past Petersen for his second straight game with a postseason goal. Matt Strome also collected an assist.

Alex Limoges then gave Hershey a power-play goal at 15:24 when he redirected a centering feed from Hendrix Lapierre behind Petersen’s glove side. Frank picked up a secondary helper, giving the forward his third point of the evening.

The Phantoms had a chance to claw away at Hershey’s lead at 12:27 of the third period when a scramble in front of the net of Shepard led to a Bears player covering the puck in the crease, resulting in a penalty shot. Bobby Brink curled through the right circle and snapped a shot that was kicked out by the right pad of Shepard to preserve the 4-1 lead for the hosts.

Lapierre put the game away at 16:30 with an empty-net goal from Trineyev.

The match concluded with a pair of altercations at 17:03 and 19:57 which led to multiple players on both teams receiving unsportsmanlike conduct penalties, accounting for 146 combined penalty minutes, and 158 combined penalty minutes in total.

Shots finished 31-16 in favor of the Phantoms. Shepard went 30-for-31 in the win for Hershey; Petersen took the loss for Lehigh Valley with an 11-for-15 effort. The Bears went 1-for-7 on the power play; the Phantoms went 0-for-3 with the man advantage.

With Hershey match report