Connect with us

Syracuse Crunch

Crunch rally to earn a point in division showdown with Toronto

Published

8 years ago

on

By Steven DiOssi | @StevenDiOssi | Like us on Facebook
March 31, 2017

The Syracuse Crunch overcame a two-goal deficit to force overtime and earn a point in the standings but fell in a shootout to the Toronto Marlies, 3-2 at War Memorial Arena on Friday.

It was the first meeting between the clubs since the Marlies beat the Crunch 4-0 on Sunday to move into first place in the North Division. Despite Friday’s loss, the Crunch are just one point behind the Marlies for the division lead and are 34-23-6-6 with 80 points this season.

It was a special evening for Crunch fans in attendance, as the franchise celebrated Slap Shot Night, which paid homage to the film that’s become a hockey cult classic with many scenes from the movie shot at War Memorial Arena. To honor the film, the Crunch wore thick glasses with white tape on the bridges during warmups and were clad in Charlestown Chiefs jerseys throughout the game — the same look the well-known Hanson brothers had when they took to the ice 40 years before.

Despite the lighthearted nature of warmups, there was a meaningful hockey game to play, as each team entered the contest with 79 points on the year in a tight race for the North Division crown.

Mike McKenna made 31 saves and Marlies goaltender stopped 24-of-26 shots in the winning effort. The Crunch were unable to capitalize on three power play attempts but held the Marlies to just 1-for-7 with the man advantage.

Toronto came out strong in the first period, outshooting the Crunch 17-7 and building a two-goal lead in the process.

The Marlies opened the scoring when Seth Griffin beat McKenna on the power play at 7:41 of the first period.

It seemingly wouldn’t be Slap Shot Night without at least a couple players dropping the gloves in the contest and at 13:34 of the period, John Kurtz and Marlies forward Sergey Kalinin made it official. They each earned five-minute fighting majors in what was the only fisticuffs of the evening.

Toronto continued their dominant opening frame by making it a two-goal game on Brendan Leipsic’s 14th goal of the season at 16:21 of the period.

But the Crunch turned things around in the second, tallying a pair of goals on six shots to close the gap.

Ben Thomas skated into the offensive zone with some speed and received an Erik Condra pass just below the blue line. Thomas skated into the right circle untouched and whipped a hard wrist shot past Sparks to make it a one-goal game at 12:16. It was the third goal of the season for the 2014 fourth-round pick who is playing his first full professional season with the Crunch. Dominik Masin also added an assist on the tally.

Minutes later, a Marlies defender took control of a loose puck behind the Toronto net and sent the puck around the boards in an attempt to clear the zone. The puck took a strange bounce off the boards and shot out front of the net where Jonathan Racine was in the right place at the right time and made it count. He swatted at the puck on his backhand and put it past Sparks to tie the game at 15:20 of the second period.

It was the second goal of Racine’s career and the first as a member of the Crunch since arriving in Syracuse as part of the trade that sent former Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman Nikita Nesterov to the Montreal Canadiens earlier this season.

The game remained tied as the teams entered the third period and the Crunch were unable to take the lead despite outshooting the Marlies by a 12-6 margin. Forcing overtime, however, did secure one point for each club in a division where just eight points separate the top four teams.

During the extra session, the Crunch couldn’t take advantage of a power play opportunity and the Marlies forced a shootout.

Tanner Richard, Cory Conacher and Matthew Peca were unable to beat Sparks on their attempts and the Marlies earned the extra point as Seth Griffin was the only player to score.

The Crunch will have another chance to take back the division lead when they face the Marlies in a rematch at home on Saturday.

Related Topics:

Copyright © 2021 National Hockey Now and Erik Erlendsson. Tampa Bay Hockey Now is an independently owned and operated site and is not affiliated with the Tampa Bay Lightning organization or the National Hockey League.