BY WARREN KOZIRESKI —
Syracuse scored three of their four goals on faceoff plays, including the last at 10:56 of overtime, to defeat Rochester 4-3 and even their best-of-five series at one game each with game three in Syracuse Thursday.
The Amerks led 2-0 as Michael Mersch netted a first period power play goal and Linus Weissbach scored in the second period, but Syracuse used a final-minute tally in the second by Jordy Bellerive to build momentum heading into the third period.
Gage Goncalves redirected a point shot at 4:59 and defenseman Sean Day gave the Crunch a 3-2 lead at 9:03 before Rochester forward Mason Jobst was able to tie contest 3-3 at 16:06 after a long head-man pass off the boards by defenseman Ethan Prow—one of just four shots on goal the Amerks managed over the final 20 minutes of regulation.
After a controversial icing call on the Amerks in overtime, Gabriel Fortier won the face-off and redirected defenseman Declan Carlile’s shot past Rochester goaltender Devon Levi for the game-winner.
“Terrible call…clear as day,” Rochester head coach Seth Appert said about the icing call in overtime. “You can hear it (Tyson Kozak tipping the puck at center ice) from the bench. It’s not why we lost…we gave up three face-off goals tonight and our centers need to do a better job.”
“Tough one to swallow for myself, especially because I took the draw,” Jobst said. “I take a lot of pride in trying to win those especially at critical times.
“There are a lot of swings when we play these guys, we’re so evenly matched. I think that’s the way the series is going to continue to go and we just gotta manage the puck and try to limit as many of the swings in their direction as we possibly can.”
20 of Syracuse’s 34 shots on goal came after the second period.
After Thursday’s game three, the Crunch will host game four Saturday night and game five, if needed, will be in Rochester on Fri. May 10th.
