Twenty-four hours since their first playoff game since the 2013-14 season, the Amerks looked to brush the stink off from a 6-2 loss to the Syracuse Crunch.
Syracuse picked up where they left off last night and nabbed the first goal of the evening, from Matthew Peca.
The Crunch’s lead held for most of the first but the Amerks could not be held off the board for too long. Colin Blackwell grabbed his first goal of the playoff series, tying the game at one late in the first.
Unfortunately, Rochester could not bring a tie game to the first intermission. Mathieu Joseph’s first of the series would give the Crunch a 2-1 lead head into the break.
That is when things started to get crazy for both sides.
Following the first intermission, we ended up seeing a combined eight goals.
Both Syracuse and Rochester would score two goals in the second and two goals in the third.
The Amerks were unable to find a way to get past the Crunch for the second straight game and the second straight night. Rochester has themselves in a very dire 0-2 hole in a best-of-five series.
Things are not good down on the farm and it only took two days for the playoff momentum to turn south.
The Amerks will look to avoid a sweep on Wednesday night, when they host the Crunch at the Blue Cross Arena.
Either the Amerks need to make history or they are history.
Final: Syracuse 6, Rochester 5
Shots on Goal: Rochester 25 | Syracuse 22
Amerks Goal Scorers: Colin Blackwell (1), Justin Bailey (1), Stuart Percy (1), Kevin Porter (1), Nicholas Baptiste (1)
Crunch Goal Scorers: Matthew Peca (1), Mathieu Joseph (1), Olivier Archambault (1), Reid McNeill (1), Alexander Volkov (1, 2)
Three Stars of the Game:
1. Matthew Peca: 1 goal, 3 assists
2. Alexander Volkov: 2 goals
3. Erik Condra: 2 assists
Quote from the game: “I thought we pushed back tonight,” Nicholas Baptiste told Amerks.com. “Last night they came at us pretty hard, but I thought we had a better answer tonight. We have to try and start every game like that. We cannot let a team go up 4-1 in the playoffs. Syracuse is a good team and in the playoffs for a reason. We now have to regroup, go back to Rochester and take it one period at a time.”