JOHN’S, NL – After going down by two early in the first period, Slater Koekkoek, Dylan Blujus and Andrew Yogan notched three consecutive goals for the Syracuse Crunch to climb back and take over the lead. However, the St. John’s IceCaps evened the score in the third to force overtime and eventually surpassed the Crunch, 4-3, in the extra frame tonight at the Mile One Centre.
By making it to overtime, the Crunch picked up one point as they dropped their seventh consecutive game and move to 19-20-9-1 on the season. The IceCaps victory builds a 3-0-1-0 lead in the eight-game season series and advances the team to 21-18-7-3.
Crunch goaltender Kristers Gudlevskis made 15 saves on 19 shots. Zachary Fucale earned his second straight win, stopping 36-of-39 between the pipes for the IceCaps. For the second night, St. John’s was effective on the power play, going 3-for-5, while Syracuse went 1-for-3.
The IceCaps were perfect on the man-advantage in the opening period, netting two power-play goals in the first seven minutes. Victor Bartley first lit the lamp at the 3:26 mark. He received a feed from Ryan Johnston and fired a slap shot over the shoulder of Gudlevskis from the center point. At 7:01, Mark MacMillan extended the lead with a goal from the left circle. Tim Bozon was credited with the primary assist and Johnston recorded his second point of the night with the secondary helper.
The Crunch mounted a comeback beginning at the 7:57 mark. Koekkoek walked the blue line before ripping one from the left point for his fourth of the season. The assist went to Daniel Walcott. With 5:34 remaining in the period, Blujus tied the game from the left circle on the power play. Koekkoek carried the puck through the slot and sauced it for Blujus to one-time past Fucale. Tye McGinn grabbed a point on the equalizer.
Syracuse finally took over the lead with 3:30 remaining in the middle stanza. Yogan flew down the right wing side and sent the puck bar down off a feed from Walcott.
The Crunch lead didn’t last long and the IceCaps converted on another power play opportunity five minutes into the third period. After a series of cross-ice passes from Charles Hudon and Morgan Ellis, Nikita Scherbak swept one in from the back door to knot the teams for the second time and eventually force overtime.
Hudon went on to beat Gudlevskis on the breakaway 1:45 into the extra frame to defeat the Crunch, 4-3.
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