REPORT: From Paused To Play, Phantoms To Resume On-Ice Practice Saturday

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ALLENTOWN, Pa. - While the cause for the sudden suspension of play after the first period of Lehigh Valley Phantoms' Wednesday night game in Newark, NJ was deemed by the American Hockey League (AHL) as "due to league COVID-19 protocols affecting the [Binghamton] Devils", it has also - albeit currently indirectly - affected the Phantoms as well.

Let's start with what is public, and on the record.

After Wednesday night's game was suspended, the AHL on Thursday rescheduled Binghamton's home game Friday against Hershey to April 28th.

On Friday, the league also rescheduled the Phantoms' Saturday home matchup with the Devils, moving that game to Sunday, April 11 at 5:15 p.m. ET at PPL Center.

Now, what we're hearing..

Inside AHL Hockey first reported shortly after Wednesday's game was suspended, according to multiple sources, that a positive test result was discovered on the Binghamton Devils side, and that was why play was halted.

The Phantoms canceled their Thursday and Friday practices according to multiple sources close to the situation, in response to Wednesday night's debacle and out of an abundance of caution.

One source followed up on Saturday morning, informing Inside AHL Hockey that the Phantoms are resuming practice Saturday for the first time since Wednesday night's game in Newark.

At the time of this first report, it wasn't known who was and wasn't participating.

The Phantoms have several injured players who have missed game action recently (Tyler Wotherspoon, Logan Day, Chris Bigras, Maksim Sushko, Max Willman, Linus Sandin) as well as recently reassigned forward Wade Allison - now healthy enough to be removed from the season-opening injured reserve after an ankle injury required surgery back during the Flyers' NHL preparations for this season.

All signs point to the Phantoms' Sunday road game in Hershey as being played as scheduled at 3:00 p.m. ET at Giant Center.

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