The Lehigh Valley Phantoms came into the weekend knowing they were going to be playing in the AHL Calder Cup Playoffs, but they didn't know whether they would be the second or third seed.

The difference between the two is the No. 2 seed enjoys home-ice advantage for the first round, and the No. 3 seed doesn't.All Lehigh Valley needed was a win - ironically, on their home ice - against Providence Friday night to wrap up the second seed in the divisional playoffs. For most of the game, though, Providence was making the PPL Center ice their own, taking a 4-1 lead early in the second period.Phantoms head coach Scott Gordon pulled the plug on goalie Alex Lyon at that point, going with Martin Ouellette, who had just been recalled from Reading earlier in the day because of an injury to Anthony Stolarz.As it turned out, Ouellette was up to the task. The score remained 4-1 until Collin McDonald tallied his 25th goal of the season with 10:51 left in the game, making it a 4-2 contest.Lehigh Valley was unable to take advantage of any momentum from the goal, until they went on a power play with 3:52 left in regulation. A little over a minute later, Greg Carey netted his 28th goal to make it a one-goal game, and suddenly things were interesting.With both teams at full strength, Andy Miele would tie the game with just :31 left in regulation, scoring for the 12th time as a member of the Phantoms."We never feel like we're out of it, and we have that confidence that even though we're down by a couple, we always feel like we're going to give ourselves a good chance to win," said McDonald. "That's a good team that had our number the last couple of games, but I give the credit to the guys in this room, because they have a lot of character, and you could feel it turning there in the third period."Things turned even more just :48 into overtime when Corban Knight made home ice official for Lehigh Valley with his 12th goal of the season, allowing the celebration to officially begin."All the guys were saying 'We just need one' and you had the feeling that when that went in [McDonald's goal], that if we could just get a couple more shots, good things were going to happen," said Knight.The win sets up a first-round playoff meeting with rival Hershey in a best-of-five series that begins Friday night in Allentown. Games one and two - game two is Saturday night - will be at the PPL Center, with game three in Hershey. If necessary, Game 4 will also be in Hershey, with a potential Game 5 scheduled for Allentown a week from Sunday. The Phantoms were 7-4-1 against Hershey during the regular season.Home ice against Hershey is particularly important, because their home record (24-8-5-1) this season was even better than the Phantoms mark of 23-11-4-0, which was fifth-best in the Eastern Conference. Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, the top team in the Atlantic Division, had the best regular season home record in the Eastern Conference at 27-9-0-2.NO STOLIE THE GOALIE ... Anthony Stolarz's knee injury requires offseason surgery to correct, putting him out until training camp. One of the things that the Phantoms had going for them was the goalkeeping tandem of Lyon and Stolarz in goal.NO PRESSURE THERE ... 18-year old goalie Carter Hart was reassigned from the Everett Silvertips of the Western Hockey League to the Phantoms. Hart was a second-round pick, and the 48th overall pick, of the Flyers in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft.THE OTHER GUYS ... The other Atlantic Division series pits the top-seeded Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins against the Providence Bruins. Should Providence knock off the Pens, and the Phantoms win their series, Lehigh Valley would have home ice for that series as well. Most likely though, if the Phantoms advance past the first round, they'll have to face the Penguins in round two, without home-ice advantage on their side.