The Belleville Senators survived a late Laval surge to win 4-3 at Place Bell Friday night.
Jordan Murray, Josh Norris, Christian Jaros and Logan Brown scored for the Senators while Joey Daccord made 40 saves. Laval’s Cayden Primeau turned aside 13 shots as Kevin Lynch, Riley Barber and Phil Varone found the back of the net.
Murray had the only goal of the first and it came on the man advantage at 11:22 as the Sens d-man was left with ample of space in the right circle to skate in and pick his spot past Primeau for his fifth of the year. Daccord kept the Sens lead intact after 20 as he denied Charles Hudon with the glove on a breakaway less than a minute after Murray had opened the scoring.
It took just 49 seconds into the second for the Sens to double its lead and it came through Norris’ 23rd of the season as he completed a pretty passing play with the whole net open in front after Alex Formenton had pulled Primeau out of position.
It was 3-0 at 16:10 as Jaros stopped a clearing attempt with his hands before unloading a slap shot for his second of the year. After Sens d-man Hubert Labrie hammered Nikita Jevpalovs with an open ice hit and dropped Michael Pezzetta with a right-hand in the ensuing melee, Laval got on the board with two seconds left in the period as Lynch buried a rebound out front after Daccord had initially stopped Jevpalovs.
Belleville made it 4-1 3:11 into the third as Brown scored on the power play before Barber cut the deficit in half with a power play goal of his own 1:42 later. Varone made it 4-3 with 4:19 to play as he scored back door on his third of the season but the Sens held on in the dying minutes in large part due to Daccord’s 13 saves in the period.
Norris’ 23rd goal tied Jack Rodewald’s record for goals in a season and broke a deadlock with Drake Batherson for most goals in a season by a rookie.
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