SYRACUSE, N.Y. – Gabriel Dumont recorded his first postseason hat trick to lead the Syracuse Crunch to a 6-2 victory over the Rochester Americans in Game 1 of the North Division Semifinals tonight at the War Memorial Arena.
Twelve different Crunch players tallied a point in tonight’s victory to take a 1-0 lead in 
the best-of-five series.
Eddie Pasquale turned aside 28-of-30 shots in net for the Crunch, while Linus Ullmark stopped 28-of-33 between the pipes for the Amerks. The Crunch went 1-for-4 on the power play and 4-for-5 on the penalty kill.
Syracuse opened scoring just three minutes into the first period. Carter Verhaeghe tipped a feed into the slot for Dumont to pick up and light the lamp with a last minute shot from the goal line. Jamie McBain earned the secondary assist.
The Amerks answered back just 50 seconds later on the power-play when Zach Redmond ripped a slap shot from the blue line off a feed from Seth Griffith. Kevin Porter tallied a helper on the equalizer.
McBain put the Crunch back on top halfway through the first period. Dumont sent a cross-ice feed for the defenseman to score with a wrister from the top of the right circle. Alexander Volkov earned a point on the go-ahead goal.
Rochester tied the game for a second time with 52 seconds remaining in the first. Kyle Criscuolo came in on a breakaway and beat Pasquale five-hole. C.J. Smith and Griffith registered the assists.
Dominik Masin scored the lone goal of the second period to put the Crunch back in the lead. Matthew Peca fired a one-timer from the right circle that was blocked. Mitchell Stephens was unable to jam in the rebound, but Masin finally chipped in the loose puck.
Syracuse doubled their lead halfway through the third period. After picking up a pass from McBain, Daniel Walcott sped down the right wing and backhanded a feed across the crease for Brendan Bradley to shove in as he crashed the net. Six minutes later, the Crunch made it 5-2 when Dumont tipped Erik Cernak’s shot from the left point. Mathieu Joseph tallied a point on the play. Dumont then completed the hat trick with an empty-netter off a pass from Erik Condra to close out the game.
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