Courtesy of Amerks.com
Rochester, N.Y. – The Rochester Americans (16-9-3-0) scored once in each period and relied on a near-perfect 22-save performance from goaltender Devon Levi to secure a 3-1 bounce-back win in Friday’s rematch against the intrastate rival Syracuse Crunch (11-9-4-3) at The Blue Cross Arena.
With the win, which came after dropping the first of the two-game set Wednesday, Rochester has earned at least one point in 18 of its last 24 games dating back to Oct. 23. Additionally, the Amerks have posted a 5-1-0-0 record in their last six regular-season games against the Crunch, which includes a 3-1-0-0 mark through the first four matchups of 2024-25.
Forward Viktor Neuchev earned an assist on Nikita Novikov’s first-period goal before he sealed the victory with his fifth of the season in the final two minutes of regulation. Novikov notched his third of the campaign while Graham Slaggert added his sixth in the middle frame which came while Rochester was shorthanded. Mason Jobst, Josh Dunne, Brett Murray, and Konsta Helenius all registered an assist to cap the scoring.
Goaltender Devon Levi improved to 8-2-1 with Rochester as he stopped all but one of the 23 shots he faced while earning the win. The netminder, who boasts a 5-3-2 record against the Crunch, is 7-1-0 in his last eight appearances.
FIRST PERIOD
On the opening shift, Isak Rosén and Helenius darted up the ice on an odd man rush towards Syracuse goaltender Brandon Halverson. While Rosén’s attempt went wide of the net and eventually cleared out of the zone, Helenius retrieved Ryan Johnson’s poke check at a center ice before rimming it around the zone from just inside the blueline. As Neuchev gathered the puck, he moved it to Novikov, who weaved his way through the Crunch defense before snaping his third goal of the season just 44 seconds into the contest.
As the Amerks tested Halverson 10 more times in the final 19 minutes of the period and limited the Crunch to just four shots, they went into the intermission break with a 1-0 lead.
SECOND PERIOD
Rochester doubled its lead 30 seconds after taking its first penalty of the night. As Syracuse had the puck inside the left face-off dot, Dunne intercepted it before darting up the ice. Once he stepped across the blueline, he dropped it for Slaggert, who took two more strides before picking the upper corner as Dunne screened Halverson with 16:45 left in the frame.
Neither team found much offensively despite each being whistled for another infraction and the Crunch outshooting the home club by a 10-5 advantage.
THIRD PERIOD
Trailing 2-0 to begin the third period, Syracuse spoiled Levi’s bid for his third shutout of the season with Declan Carlile’s second tally of the year at the 11:20 mark. The blueliner joined the rush and converted Logan Brown’s backdoor feed to make it a 2-1 game.
Seven minutes following Crunch goal, Rochester was whistled for a slashing infraction, giving Syracuse its fifth power-play of the night.
Despite skating down a player, the Amerks did not allow a successful shot on Levi during the penalty kill before Halverson was pulled for the extra-attacker moments afterwards.
As Murray was pinned against the wall inside his own zone, he and Jobst teamed up to flip the puck out of the zone for Neuchev to track down near the far blueline. The second-year winger won the race to the loose puck, avoided a backcheck from a Crunch skater and tucked it into the vacant net with just over two minutes to play to seal the 3-1 win.
Rochester finished off the win to split the two-game series as they held off one final push by Syracuse.
STARS AND STRIPES
The Amerks are a perfect 6-0-0-0 in the six games in which Nikita Novikov has scored dating back to last season … Four of Novikov’s six tallies have come in the opening period of play … Graham Slaggert tallied his third shorthanded goal of the campaign, tying him with Bridgeport’s Brian Pinho for the league lead in that category … With Slaggert’s three shorthanded goals this season and former Amerk Brandon Biro scoring three in 2023-24, it marks the first time since 2009-10 and 2010-11 the Amerks had a player score three or more shorthanded goals in back-to-back seasons.
UP NEXT
The Amerks play their final game prior to the annual Christmas break as they travel to Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse on Sunday, Dec. 22 for a 3:00 p.m. matinee with the Cleveland Monsters. The North Division matchup will be carried live on The Sports Leader 95.7 FM/950 AM The Fan Rochester as well as AHLTV on FloHockey.
It was night and day, these last 2 games. Wednesday was dull, listless, and totally boring hockey. Last night the Amerks played, for the most part an energetic, and purposeful game and were rewarded with the 2 points.
It wasn’t without its ‘moments’. The power play is still a mess. In 5 tries Amerks looked disorganized, as they have been all season. They actually seem to generate better offense when short-handed on many occasions.
In the 3rd period they knew Crunch were going to come on strong and that was the case as Amerks spent far too much time in their own zone, chasing Crunch players all over the place. It was inevitable that Syracuse would finally score, leaving 8 more minutes to sweat it out. When Amerks took another penalty with around 4 minutes to play, a very eerie quiet descended on the rink, as though the impending doom of a tie game was just seconds away.
It didn’t happen on this night. The PK was perfect and all that was left was to prevent Crunch from scoring with the goalie pulled. Amerks scored instead to seal the deal. Levi was strong in a nice bounceback from Wednesday’s uneven performance (for him)
Important game Sunday as the good guys try and get closer to the top of the standings. The biggest impediment is still Toronto with all those games in hand.
Rosen and Murray lead the team in goals with 12 each and nobody else has more than 6. The weather was pretty bad but a decent crowd of just over 6600 were on hand.
We now all await what is going to happen in Buffalo. Will they make changes? And if so, how will impact the Amerks? They go to Boston this evening hoping to stop the 12 game losing streak. I wouldn’t count them out as Bruins could easily blow this game.