By KEVIN OKLOBZIJA
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — For the better part of 35 minutes on Wednesday night, the Hershey Bears were precisely the team Rochester Americans coach Michael Leone expected to see.
Big, heavy, talented, smart, quick and skilled.
Which is why, when the Amerks made mistakes, the Bears capitalized and skated to a 3-2 victory at Blue Cross Arena at the War Memorial.
No box-out at the goal mouth, when left rookie Lynden Lakovic along to sweep home a rebound 13:54 into the first period.
A failure to get the puck deep, which led to the Bears going the other way and Lakovic setting up Petr Sikora for a tap-in goal 2:32 into the second period.
When Hershey defenseman Louie Belpedio drove a slap shot past goalie Matthew Villalta just 24 seconds later, the Amerks were staring at a 3-0 deficit.
And while they mounted a rally late in the period, pulling within 3-2 on goals by Aidan McDonough and Carson Meyer 1:24 apart, their power play again failed them when they needed it most.
“We have to have more to give to get things tied up,” said McDonough, who has four goals in nine games.
Twice the Bears took penalties in the third period, at 7:37 and 14:36, but the Amerks (4-4-0-1) mounted little pressure. On the final power play, they couldn’t even maintain sustained puck possession in the Hershey zone.
Which was again the Bears (6-2) playing to that identity of big, heavy, talented, smart, quick and skilled.
“That team’s going to win a lot of games,” Leone said. “They’re really good.”
The Amerks, meanwhile, weren’t nearly good enough on Wednesday, which makes back to back less-than-stellar home games (over a seven-day period). They lost 5-3 to Utica on Oct. 21, with two late garbage-time goals making the score much closer than the game itself.
In between was a 3-2 overtime victory at Syracuse on Saturday.
“We just have to take more pride in it,” McDonough said of playing on home ice. “We knew what we had to do to beat Syracuse and it took everything; being responsible for 60 minutes. We have to be able to bring it consistently.”
That’s especially true of the power play, although being without an injured Conor Sheary certainly hurt. He has been nearly a point-a-game player through eight games (1-6-7).
Over the past six games, the Amerks are just 3-for-27 with the man advantage (11.1 percent). After scoring nine of his 23 goals last season for Wilkes-Barre/Scranton on the power play, he was taking some of the responsibility for the lack of proficiency.
“It’s a full unit (but) I need to be a lot better on the power play,” he said. “We just kind of lack that killer instinct.
“There’s plenty of time (to correct it); it’s Game 9. But it lost us the game tonight.”
Familiar name with the Bears
Hershey forward Lynden Lakovic is the nephew of the late Sasha Lakovic, who played one season for the Amerks (3-9-12/161 penalty minutes in 2000-01, his last of five AHL seasons).
Lynden Lakovic was selected in the first round (27th overall) of the 2025 NHL draft by the Washington Capitals.
Familiar face returns
Josh Dunne returned to Rochester wearing a Bears sweater. A heart-and-soul leader of the 2024-25 Amerks, he signed with the Capitals organization in the summer after spending all but two games of last season in the NHL with the Buffalo Sabres.
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