Recapping The Marlies First Round

After a hard-fought regular season series, it came as no surprise that the Marlies won the first 2 games of the AHL Western Conference Quarterfinal series with a one-goal edge. Amazingly enough, none of the games went to overtime even though in games 1 and 2 Marlies forward Jerry D’Amigo scored the game-winning goals late in the 3rd period – at 15:43 and 18:10.

Game 3 was the only match-up between the Americans and Marlies both in the regular season and playoffs that ended with a multiple goal difference – Toronto won the game 3:0. It was also the first match-up this season where the Americans couldn’t score on the Marlies.

Ricoh Coliseum was sold out for Game 2, which is good news, given the fact Marlies were only 14th in the AHL with an average attendance of 5,480.

As for Jerry D’Amigo, the 21-year-old 5’7, 215-pound left winger was easily the best player for the Marlies in the 3-game sweep of the Americans. He scored 5 goals and picked up 1 assist for 6 points while his plus-minus was +6. You can’t help but notice D’Amigo really adds another gear to his game when it comes to games with extra pressure.

Back at the 2010 World Juniors in Saskatchewan D’Amigo scored 6 goals and notched 6 assist in 7 games for Team USA, which ended up winning the tournament beating Team Canada in overtime in the gold medal game.

Last season D’Amigo scored 6 goals and added 3 assists to that in 7 games of the OHL playoffs he took part in as a Kitchener Ranger. Meanwhile, in the regular season he had just 12 goals in 21 games.

In his first season as a Marlie D’Amigo scored 15 goals and had 26 assists for 41 points in 76 regular season games.

Jerry D’Amigo  –  5+1=6 points, +6

Mike Zigomanis – 2+1=3 points, +1

Nicolas Deschamps – 1+2=3 points, +2

Philippe Dupuis – 1+2=3 points, +1

Matt Frattin – 1+2=3 points, +2

Joe Colborne – 0+3=3 points, 0

Ben Scrivens was another noticeable player for the Marlies in the series. In fact, after 1st round he was tied in the league for the 2nd place with the Barons’ goalie Yann Danis in shutouts (1), tied for the 3rd place with the Heat’s Danny Taylor in GAA (2.00) and his SAV% with 5th best at .923.

Marlies powerplay was 10th in the league in the first round – with 14 attempts in 3 games they managed to score just twice (14.3%). San Antonio Rampage were the best in this category with 31.8PP%. Nevertheless, Toronto’s penalty killing was 4th best in the league at 91.7% (Marlies successfully killed off 11 of 12 penalties).