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Alex Bump is on a heater, something anyone who follows the Lehigh Valley Phantoms is well aware of. He has four goals and 11 assists to lead the team in points while establishing himself as a top-line winger. In the Nov. 23 game against the Hartford Wolf Pack, Bump was the one who assisted the game-winner with a centering pass to Denver Barkey on the rush, a play that gave the Phantoms a 3-2 victory.
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He entered the AHL this season with an eye on the NHL. The Philadelphia Flyers needed Bump to prove that he’s more than just a scorer or specifically a winger with a good shot. He needed to play a complete game, and he’s done that. Bump is scoring but also setting up scoring chances, stepping up on defense, and playing a physical game, something he struggled to do in his brief time with the Phantoms last season.
“Nobody’s gonna question his skillset or his ability to make plays and hold on to the puck. He’s got that unique talent to slide through checks,” Phantoms head coach John Snowden noted after the recent win. Bump’s assists in that game saw him fend off a check along the boards to keep the play alive and ultimately find Barkey for the game-winner, a sign that he’s playing the physical game along with the skilled one.
With the way he’s playing and the level he’s playing at, the question is what more he must do to prove he belongs on the NHL roster? Bump was close in the offseason and remains on the outside looking in to make it to the NHL someday. He’s just not there yet.
Bump Must Show Consistency
The life of a shooter is an inconsistent one. Some games don’t have the open looks and the scoring chance, and others provide them in bunches. It’s why the Kyle Connors or Bo Horvats of hockey have their highs and lows (Connor, for example, has five of his 11 goals this season in a five-game stretch). Bump has his flashes as well but that’s what they are, flashes.
He has four goals this season, yet three of them came in a five-game stretch. Bump must consistently create offense for the Flyers to confidently call him up. “I think he just needs to keep doing it consistently. Can he do it every single game?” Snowden stated.
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Lately, Bump has done that. While the goals aren’t there, his ability to generate offense is. “It’s not going to be every game but he’s trending in that right direction,” Snowden added after the latest game. The Oct. 31 game against the Wolf Pack was his first on the Lane Pederson and Denver Barkey line. He scored a goal and added an assist in the comeback victory, where the Phantoms rallied from a 3-1 deficit to win 4-3 in overtime. That was the start of something special for Bump, as he’s scored three goals while adding nine assists to the offense since then.
The line change has unlocked Bump and his offensive skill. More importantly, with his linemates pushing him, it’s changed how he’s played.
The Compete & Drive to Win
Barkey has a motor that brings out the best in his line. He not only skates hard in all three zones but also fights on every shift to give the Phantoms an edge. It’s helped make Bump a more competitive skater as he fights for loose pucks and plays above his weight. The compete that Barkey brings to every shift is starting to rub off on Bump, and it’s something the Phantoms were hoping to see out of him this season.
“You have to want to do it, and then can you do it?” Snowden remarked about Bump’s drive to play well on every shift. Lately, that’s been the case as he’s playing hard on every shift and competing in all three zones. Everyone knows what Bump can do with the puck. What he does without the puck is what everyone is trying to find out. The Phantoms are seeing what he can do, and it’s paying off for both the team and the player.
Can Bump Succeed in Every Situation?
The catch-22 of Bump’s great play is that he’s doing it on the Pederson and Barkey line. The two skaters work well with their skills and have given the Phantoms a great top line. “Barks is a mature kid, and he drives play and competes on every puck, and Petey works hard as well. So, that line competes well, and they want offense, and if you want offense, you have to compete on the other side,” Snowden noted about the line getting the most out of Bump.
The problem is that Bump won’t have those linemates all season and certainly not at the next level. Will he be the same player without them? It’s unlikely.
The Flyers have plenty of skill in their top six but Bump isn’t fighting for a top-six spot, at least not this season. A call-up will most likely land him on the third line, and he won’t have the same forwards to unlock his skills.
With the Phantoms, Bump must prove he can play well regardless of his linemates. Snowden won’t shuffle the lines anytime soon, with the team playing great and the combinations working. However, there will be a time this season when Bump will have to work with a different group. Injuries are a part of the game, and roster changes are inevitable in the AHL. When those happen, the Flyers will see what their top prospect is capable of.
Bump Must Find a Door to Enter
Laval Rocket head coach Pascal Vincent noted that most players come into the AHL as scorers and were elite on the offensive end throughout their development. “Most of those guys are goal scorers and most of the time, scoring goals isn’t enough to make it,” Vincent noted after the Nov. 15 game against the Wolf Pack, adding, “Sometimes you just need to find a door to let you in.”
Bump is no exception. He was a scorer in college and made his first impressive with the Phantoms in the 2025 Calder Cup Playoffs as a scorer with two goals in the series against the Wilkes-Barre Scranton Penguins. He must play a complete game to find a role with the NHL team. While the series against the Penguins showed his upside, the next series against the Hershey Bears showed his downsides as the heavy game and forechecking made him a non-factor. That series displayed Bump’s shortcomings, and it gave him an area to improve on throughout the season.
The Flyers have a need in their bottom six. Yes, a 6-3 victory over the New Jersey Devils stands out but the offense averages only 2.80 goals per game in part because the depth scoring isn’t there. Bump can provide that spark. That said, the Flyers also need their bottom six to have physicality, with players like Nikita Grebenkin standing out. Bump’s proven he can defend and play a physical game, and the question is whether he is physical enough to do so at the NHL level, even in a third or fourth line role.
The Flyers won’t answer that question now. They’ll give Bump time in the AHL to round out his game. The good news is that he’s starting to do just that, and it’s made his chances of a call-up at some point this season all the more likely.
