Lineup
Forward lines and defense pairings:
[one_half]Hudon – Terry – Scherbak
Matteau – de la Rose – Carr
Veilleux – Audette – Friberg
Broll – Farnham – Camara[/one_half]
[one_half_last]Hanley – Lernout
Parisi – Lowe
Brouillette – Johnston[/one_half_last]
Goaltenders:
Lindgren
Danis
Scratches: Josiah Didier, Mark MacMillan, Jeremy Gregoire, Zach Redmond (DTD), Markus Eisenschmid (undisclosed)
Injured Reserve: Martin Reway
Game Report
After a stellar weekend for the IceCaps which brought them four out of six possible points and two shutouts, they headed to Syracuse for the first of two meetings against the Crunch this week.
In the opening period, St. John’s came out flying. They outshot Syracuse 15-5 in the first 20 minutes, and sustained plenty of pressure in the offensive zone. Stefan Matteau and Charles Hudon both had excellent scoring chances in breakaways, but Kristers Gudlevskis was able to come up big and keep the puck out of the net.
Previous games in Syracuse this season have proved to be physical affairs, and this one started to heat up in the first period, with some chippy play and scrums after whistles. The two team traded penalties throughout the period, but Keegan Lowe then got called for roughing after the period for his part in a large gathering of the two benches along the far boards.
The Crunch made sure to capitalize on Lowe’s penalty in the second period, and the IceCaps found themselves down by two goals. Then, after a laser shot from the point by Julien Brouillette, Max Friberg tapped in the puck past Gudlevskis to bring his team with one goal.
St. John’s penalty killers were tested quite often in this period, and Syracuse managed to get through them once again to regain their two-goal lead. But in the third period, Brett Lernout continued his hot strike by rifling a shot toward the net which Matteau tipped in to bring the IceCaps back within one.
Try as they might, St. John’s couldn’t complete the comeback and an empty-netter scored by Syracuse in the dying seconds sealed the win for the Crunch.
The IceCaps now head to Rochester to rematch against the Americans, who they defeated 3-0 last week, before returning to Syracuse on Saturday night to wrap up this road trip.
▲ Nikita Scherbak, Max Friberg, Brett Lernout, Julien Brouillette, Stefan Matteau
▼ Tom Parisi, Anthony Camara |
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