By KEVIN OKLOBZIJA
When you go 27 days without experiencing thrill of victory, when an entire month has been nothing but the agony of defeat, there’s good reason for a display of unbridled joy after an overtime victory.
Which is why Trevor Kuntar went on a victory sprint – from the blue line at the Court Street end of Blue Cross Arena at the War Memorial to the faceoff circle at the Broad Street end – the second his shot hit the twine behind Toronto Marlies goalie Dennis Hildeby.
And why his Rochester Americans teammate, Ryan Johnson, gave gleeful chase, exhibiting perhaps the biggest smile seen on an Amerk face since mid February.
“You forget what it feels like, but it felt really good,” Johnson said after Friday night’s 4-3 win over the Marlies.
It was a victory the Amerks desperately needed. They had gone winless in the past nine (0-6-1-2); the franchise record for consecutive losses is 10.
Not only that but they had allowed a 3-1 third-period lead to evaporate in the game’s 58th minute when Ryan Tverberg and Matthew Barbolini scored just 21 seconds apart to tie the score.
Tverberg’s extra-attacker goal came on a tip-in at 17:33. Barbolini then was left alone in the slot to convert Cedric Pare’s pass from behind the net at 17:54.
A victory that seemed locked up when Vsevolod Komarov extended the Amerks lead to 3-1 at 16:15 suddenly was very much feeling yet another loss in a miserable streak.
But they managed to regroup and earn the victory in overtime, increasing their lead over sixth-place Utica to six points in the AHL’s North Division. The Amerks (25-22-5-4, 59 points) remain fifth, seven points behind the Marlies, their likely opponent in the Calder Cup mini-round play-in series.
“I thought we did a good job keeping our composure,” Amerks coach Michael Leone said.
Kuntar’s goal – his 15th of the season – came 1:23 into overtime after the Amerks controlled the puck for nearly every second of the brief extra period.
Konsta Helenius retrieved the puck off the opening faceoff just inside the Marlies zone, then he, Zac Jones and Anton Wahlberg maintained possession in the Toronto end for about 45 seconds before handing off to Kuntar, Johnson and Riley Fiddler-Schultz.
“It was an amazing play by ‘Hele’ to get the puck off the draw after we lost it,” Johnson said.
Meanwhile, the Marlies three players – Alex Nylander, Henry Thrun and Luke Haymes – were stuck on the ice chasing the entire time.
“It was so unselfish by Helenius, Jones and Wahlberg,” Kuntar said. “They had the opportunity to change and pay it forward. That’s probably the reason we scored.”
Fiddler-Schultz eventually set up Kuntar near the center point and his shot with traffic in the slot eluded Hildeby.
Once in a battle for second place in the division, the Amerks realize they no longer have an abundance of offensive firepower. Or much of any. They need to play with an edge, they need to play with snarl, which they did with vigor on Friday.
“Weve been preaching what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger for a while now,” Kuntar said.
That was certainly the necessary mantra after the Marlies scored the two late goals in the third period. Having lost nine in a row, then squandering a 3-1 lead with under three minutes to play was a perfect time to collapse.
“We’ve found ways to lose hockey games,” Leone said. “The guys stuck together.”
Goalie Scott Ratzlaff (31 saves) played very well, with little chance to stop either of the last two goals.
Olivier Nadeau and Helenius scored the other goals for the Amerks.
Rathbone out long-term
Defenseman Jack Rathbone, who suffered an upper body injury in Wednesday’s 4-1 loss to Utica, is expected to miss considerable time.
The optimistic timeline (though maybe not realistic) has him returning very late in the regular season.
Rare penalty calls
The game included one of the strangest penalty daily doubles ever. Toronto’s Pare was assessed a minor for closing his hand on the puck at 8:10 of the first period – he essentially carried the puck between defenders like a fullback in football.
Then at 7:55 of the second period, Toronto’s Noah Chadwick was given a minor for playing with a broken stick.
You might see one of those once in a season. Both in the same game? The odds are off the charts.
Thank you Kevin, you’re an Amerk legend. I have enjoyed reading your work for years.
Want to forget those two late goals. For the first time in a month or more of home games, the Amerks played like a team that came out to win, not to try and not lose.
This type of energy has been completely missing from this group (no matter how Leone tries to spin it) and last night we saw 58 minutes of winning hockey. When Kuntar scored it was heart warming to see the unbridled joy from the team as they swarmed Ratzlaff like they had just won a playoff series.
There were mistakes. Lots of errant passes and a pretty anemic power play, but they overcame those things by playing hard and not giving the Marlies a lot of room to dominate the play. It was a huge plus that #92 for them didn’t score because he seems to revel in beating us.
Remains to be seen if somehow this energy will carry over. I’m sure Toronto will be out for revenge this afternoon. So Amerks kept pace with Utica, who upset Laval and actually leapfrogged over idle Belleville. Amerks lead the Comets by 6 and the Sens by 7 and they hold two games in hand on both. Would be nice to not waste those.
Syracuse making a serious run at Laval. they trail the Rocket by 3 points with 2 in hand. Maybe they could be our opponent if we survive the mini-round? A decent crowd of 7,192 looked on and though there were several Toronto jerseys scattered about, most the fans finally went home happy.