By KEVIN OKLOBZIJA
Some nights, you can do a lot of things right and not find your name on the scoresheet.
Just ask Rochester Americans center Jiri Kulich. On Friday night, in a 6-3 loss to the Belleville Senators, he fired a career-high 11 shots on goal and left Blue Cross Arena at the War Memorial with no goals and no assists added to his season totals.
Or ask Isak Rosen, who had four shots on Friday and was around the net often, but ended up with just one assist.
And then there are nights where just about everything you touch turns to gold. Or, in Kulich’s case on Saturday evening, hats.
Kulich recorded his second career hat trick while Rosen scored twice as the Amerks throttled the Senators 8-2 in front of 8,560 fans.
“Hockey,” Rosen said, “is weird sometimes.”
Kulich would agree.
“Yesterday I had 11 shots and no goals,” Kulich said. “Tonight we played great as a team; that’s why I scored.”
In winning for the 11th time in 14 games (11-2-0-1), the second-place Amerks remained in the thick of the hunt for the American Hockey League’s North Division title with three games remaining. Syracuse, a 6-5 shootout loser to Toronto on Saturday night, leads with 84 points, the Amerks have 83 and Cleveland is third at 82. All three teams have three games to play.
Mason Jobst, Zach Metsa and Michael Mersch also scored goals for the Amerks, who soared to a 4-0 lead in the first period and led 7-0 after Kulich’s scored 1:42 into the third. He then completed his hat trick off a give-and-go with Aleksandr Kisakov with 6:40 remaining.
“I was lucky today,” Kulich said.
What he said he really wanted to do was return the hat trick favor to his linemate Rosen, who has never scored three goals in a game. Instead, it was Rosen making the play near the blue line that created Kulich’s third goal.
“Isak gave me a great surprise for my birthday,” said Kulich, who turns 20 on Sunday.
In leading the goals barrage against two Belleville goalies – starter Kevin Mandolese stopped just two of five shots and reliever Leevi Merilainen allowed five goals on 22 shots – Kulich and Rosen padded their point totals. Kulich has a team-best 25 goals as well as 18 assists. Rosen has 18 goals and 28 assists.
But while points feel good, they’re not always the end-all, be-all. While happy that the Amerks top young guns enjoyed offensive success, Amerks coach Seth Appert said the production was a byproduct of playing the game the right way.
“Something that we’ve been pounding on all of our young guys is process,” Appert said. “So much of their life as young forwards especially, they judge their worth (on points), because other people have talked to them about their worth through points only.
“The reality is, say you’re a 50-, 60-point guy in the NHL. That’s a lot of points but you’re going to get those points in probably 40, 45 games. There’s another 35 to 40 games in an NHL season. So, what are you doing in those games that you don’t score in to help the team win? And if it’s nothing, then you’re of no use to us. And so I really like that the guys have bought into that. Kulie and Rosie are playing winning hockey and tonight they got rewarded for that.”
Not to be overlooked was the rebound of Amerks goalie Devon Levi. He wasn’t at his best on Friday, giving up two goals in the first period on shots he’d almost always stop.
But even while the number of shots on Saturday were limited (22), he was in charge and didn’t allow a goal until the Amerks had a 7-0 lead.
“I try not to play the scoreboard too much, just try to stay present, regardless of what the score is,” Levi said. “Whatever the play in front of me is telling me is kind of what my focus is.
“It’s definitely nice to know the guys are scoring but it’s not exactly smart to hold on to a score, because that can change quickly, so it’s just a present-focus mindset.”
That was indeed the proper approach on Saturday because the Amerks were ahead 3-0 in just over 11 minutes. Rosen flipped home an in-tight backhander at 4:47, Jobst buried the carom of an Anton Wahlberg shot and Rosen redirected from the left circle a Jermey Davie point shot.
“I liked tonight that we did it the right way, we didn’t cheat,” Appert said. “They had a couple good defensemen out of their lineup (Dillon Heatherington and Maxence Guenette) and it was imperative on us to make the game difficult on them, especially early. Play behind them, hunt their D, make them uncomfortable.”
It was certainly a fun game to watch. Amerks haven’t had a ton of them this season but right now this is a dangerous team. Friday was a rare off night for Levi and I suspect there won’t be too many more those. He was in fine form yesterday. We all thought he would get a shutout. The 2nd goal he allowed was a bit disappointing but overall the Amerks had a jump that was really missing Friday.
So now they have 2 very key games coming up. The Marlies are still in the hunt for home ice, trailing Amerks by just 3 so its important for Amerks to put them away. Then Friday they take on Cleveland, a team they would like to stay ahead of. Final game of the year will be in Utica..and the Comets might still be trying to get a playoff spot.
Nice to see a very good crowd. They may not draw a big house on Wednesday (they never do until playoffs) but I expect a near full house Friday. The most important thing I took away from the 8-2 win was their response to the 6-3 loss on Friday against a team that has pretty much had their way with the Amerks for a few seasons now. I’d like to think it shows that when the guys play hard, they can beat anyone. Also they need Levi to be sharp because a hot goalie will do wonders for a team in the playoffs.
Anyway–should be a fun finish.
Very nice guys! Keep building a winning culture…
Coach says he thought they played well Friday too..pucks just weren’t going in. I will agree to an extent. First, their goalie stole the game. I was real surprised he wasn’t dressed Saturday. Belleville’s other 2 goalies were not good.
Where the team and fell down was early in the 3rd. A fluke goal put the Sens ahead and Amerks did not respond. Instead they gave up another real quick…one of 3 Levi should have stopped. After that, the game was over.
Saturday we saw how important goaltending is. Our guy bounced back, as expected. Their guys were pretty bad. Many of the shots that didn’t go in Friday went in Saturday. Too, I think Sens only dressed 5 ‘d’, so Amerks took advantage.
Finally the PK was a LOT better and that was helpful.
A big win against the Marlies would be outstanding Wednesday. They know we swept them out last spring so this game will have a playoff feel to it for sure. We may be seeing them again next week.
A huge lump of coal to the Sabres for not sending us Clague and Jost..and worse, being pretty silent about it too. You can always count on Buffalo to limber up the middle digit when it comes to their ‘concern’ about our welfare. that really has never changed that much and probably never will. Let’s hope we don’t really need those two going forward. At least if there is a remote legit reason (like they knew someone would grab them if exposed to waivers) it would have been nice for us to know that wouldn’t you think?