Hershey sweeps its way into the conference finals

ALBANY, NY – Every night it seems the Hershey Bears find new and exciting ways of winning hockey games. This time it was Mathieu Perreault’s turn to play the role of hero by scoring twice, once with 1:13 left to go in regulation to tie Game Four with the Albany River Rats at 4-4, and again 2:23 of overtime to not only win the game 5-4 but it gave Hershey the sweep of Albany and a date in the Eastern Conference finals for the second straight season.   Thursday night’s comeback was a tad different for the Bears. This time Hershey scored the first goal of the game when Chris Bourque scored his third goal of the playoffs on the power play 8:23 into the first period, but Albany scored the next two goals in the first to give the Rats a 2-1 lead heading into the second period. Bourque scored his second of the game 59 seconds into the second period, also on the power play to tie the game back at 2-2. Zach Boychuk scored in the second and Jermome Samson scored in the third to put the River Rats back in front 4-2 midway through the third period. As usual the Bears came storming back thanks to Perreault and Alexandre Giroux and to set up the exciting finish in what would become the River Rats last game ever in Albany. Next season the team will be moving to Charlotte, North Carolina. Hershey went 3-5 in the power play while Albany went 1-3. With the win the Bears are now 8-1 in the playoffs and have a combined record of 68-18-0-3 record (regular season and playoffs). The Bears will not await the winner of the Worchester Sharks/Manchester Monarchs series which is tied at 1-1. Contact the author at Brian.Jennings@prohockeynews.com
Contact the photographer at Lewis.Bleiman@prohockeynews.com