All night long: Wednesday notes

When Carolina and Philadelphia affiliates get together, clear the schedule. The Philly Phantoms and Albany River Rats played what was the longest game in AHL history 10 years ago. Lehigh Valley and Charlotte passed that tonight, and Alex Krushelnyski was the hero 6:48 into the fifth overtime. Lehigh Valley wins 2-1, taking a 3-1 series lead to Game 5 on Saturday at Charlotte. Cole Bardreau set up Krushelnyski just inside the left circle after Alex Nedeljkovic shrugged off a Colin McDonald bad-angle shot.

The teams played four seconds shy of 120 minutes between goals, and ex-Yalie Alex Lyon stopped 75 79 shots in that 119:56. He made 94 saves in all; the only period in which he didn’t have 10 saves was the shortened last one. And the Phantoms played five defensemen most of the night after losing Samuel Morin to injury early in the game.

The Checkers killed a too-many-men penalty in the third overtime, then a shift later had to kill a Valentin Zykov trip. But they did, and even with those two power plays, the Phantoms were credited with just one shot on goal in the third overtime. Late in that period, T.J. Brennan denied Janne Kuokkanen a breakaway with a hold, but the Phantoms killed that one off.

They played on, and at least they’ve got a couple of days to regroup.

(For fun, go back through Tony Androckitis’ Twitter timeline: Come for the weird hockey, stay for the panic about his flight home.)

Pretty much any other night, Jeremy Colliton would’ve led this post. His IceHogs are 6-0 in the playoffs, up 3-0 in the Central Division Final, after tonight’s 4-1 home win over Manitoba. Rockford can finish it off Friday night at home and keep the run going. Noted on Twitter: In Jeremy Colliton’s rookie year, Bridgeport won three games against the Penguins. The Sound Tigers won another in 2009 with Colliton injured and another in 2010 with Colliton over in Europe, and they’ve won none since. So that’s one more AHL playoff win this year for Coach Colliton than his old team has since he debuted as the top-line centerman.

Further west, Mike McKenna throws his like-second-and-a-half (he had that 68-minutes-of-scoreless-relief game) shutout in Texas’ 2-0 win over Tucson in Game 4, taking a 3-1 series lead.

At Worlds, huge win for Denmark over Finland; goal and an assist on the game-winner for Frans Nielsen. The coaching change didn’t seem to do much for Belarus against Switzerland; point for Nino Niederreiter. Anders Nilsson shut out Austria.

And RIP, Eunice Groark.

Michael Fornabaio