The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins continued to dominate the season series with rival Lehigh Valley, defeating the Phantoms, 5-1, on Sunday afternoon at Mohegan Arena.
The Penguins (41-16-6-2) extended their winning streak to four game and improved to 17-9-4-1 at home. They are also 8-0-1-1 on the season against the Phantoms.
Wilkes-Barre/Scranton scored the first five goals in cruising to the victory. Joona Koppanen, Chase Pietila and Tanner Howe scored in a 7:37 span of the first period to jump out to a 3-0 lead. Howe was particularly effective in the first period, recording two assists besides scoring his goal. He later assisted on a Rafael Harvey-Pinard’s goal in the third period to give him eight for the season. Pinard finished with two assists.
Late in the second period, Aidan McDonough scored his 20th of the season at 18:24 to make it 4-0. It was his fourth straight game with a goal.
Pinard scored his 18th of the season at 4:20 of the third to make it 5-0. Koppanen, who had two assists, now has 14 for the season.
Joel Blomqvist started in goal for the Penguins and stopped the first 30 shots he faced before Lehigh Valley’s Zayde Wisdom deflected a puck past him with 1:18 remaining to spoil the shutout bid.
The Penguins outshot Lehigh Valley, 34-31, and went 1 of 3 on the power play. Lehigh Valley was 0 for 5 with the man advantage.
Of the seven games left in the regular season, the Penguins will play five at home. They return to Mohegan Arena on Friday night at 7:05 to host Lehigh Valley. The next night they play the Phantoms in Allentown at 7:05 p.m. The final game of the regular season is April 18 at home against Rochester.