By Stan Smith
After struggling to score consistently of late, the Toronto Marlies found their offence this past weekend. They scored 17 goals in the three games they played, winning two of those games and losing one.
Before I get into the games, I have to comment on the schedule for the Marlies over the weekend. It’s bad enough having to play three games in three days. How about playing three games in 48 hours?
On Friday, the Marlies were in Rochester to take on the Americans with the game starting at 7 pm. Both teams traveled to Toronto for a game that started at 4 pm on Saturday. Toronto then hosted the Laval Rocket on Sunday with that game also having a 4 pm start. A regular game usually takes between 2 ½ and 3 hours to play. With that being the case, between 7 pm on Friday and 7 pm on Sunday, a period of 48 hours, the Marlies would have completed three full hockey games. On top of that, they would have had to travel from Rochester to Toronto.
And then guess what? They have to do it all over again this coming weekend.
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Rochester Americans 5 – Marlies 3
The weekend began auspiciously enough with the Marlies losing in Rochester 5-3.
The game started well enough for Toronto as Logan Shaw scored on the opening shift. The rest of the period was all Americans. They outplayed and outshot the Marlies 16-8 and went into the first intermission with a 2-1 lead.
The rest of the game was the Devon Levi show as the Marlies dominated the last 40 minutes, and outshot the Americans 36 to 9. The Rochester goalie would stop 34 of those 36 shots. Roni Hirvonen scored with 19 seconds remaining in the second period and Josiah Slavin scored a meaningless goal with seven seconds left in the third period.
This was not a good game for Dennis Hideby. He allowed five goals on 25 shots. The last three goals the Americans scored were situations where Toronto had numerous chances to score but were stymied by Levi. Rochester then came down the ice, got one shot on the Marlies’ net and it went in. I am sure Hildeby would have liked to have had two of those goals back.
Marlies 7 – Rochester Americans 3
Different game. Same teams. Different goalie. Different result.
After being stoned by Levi the night before, the Marlies had much more success against Rochester goalie Dustin Tokarski on Saturday, beating him five times on 26 shots.
After a scoreless first period, Nick Abruzzese and Dylan Gambrell each found the twine in the opening five minutes of the second to take a 2-0 lead. The Americans would retaliate with two goals to tie the game at 2-2 by the 15-minute mark of the period. The teams would exchange goals 21 seconds apart in the last 90 seconds of the period to go into the 2nd intermission tied at three.
Bellows would put the Marlies up 5-3 with a goal at the 1:03 mark and another at 13:58. Toronto would add empty net goals by Joe Blandisi and Mikko Kokkonen to close out the scoring at 7-3.
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Marlies 7 – Laval Rocket 1
This game was never in doubt after the Marlies opened with four goals in the first period. Bellows, Blandisi, Hirvonen, and Abruzzese all scored. The two teams each scored once in the second period. Then Blandisi, with his second of the game, and Matteo Petroniro rounded out the scoring for the Marlies in the third period.
After struggling in Rochester on Friday night, Hildeby had a nice bounce-back game on Sunday stopping 30 of the 31 shots he faced.
Individual Performances
Eighteen different skaters shared in the scoring over the three games. Bellows led the way with six points (3G, 3A) including a four-point game on Saturday. Shaw and Abruzzese had two goals and three assists each to finish the weekend with five points apiece.
Petroniro had more points over the weekend than he had in his first 23 games this season. He had a goal and three assists for a total of four points in the three games. In Petroniro’s first 23 games this season, he had managed one goal and two assists. Petrniro had not seen any action since January 6th. I have to say that I have also noticed that Petroniro has returned with a little more physical edge to his game.
Hildeby had a mixed weekend, great game on Sunday, not so great on Friday. Overall, he stopped 50 of 56 shots, giving him a .893 SV% for the two games. Luke Cavallin played against Rochester on Saturday night and stopped 30 of 33 shots to even his record on the season to 2-2-2.
The Playoff Race
The four points the Marlies picked up on the weekend moved them into a tie with the Belleville Senators for fourth place in the North Division at 65 points. They are three points back of the Rochester Americans for third place with two games in hand and three up on the sixth-place Laval Rocket. They also have two games in hand. The top five teams make the postseason.
What’s Next?
As I wrote at the start of this post, the Marlies play three more games in 48 hours this coming weekend. They are back in Rochester on Friday night for another game against the Americans. They return home to take on the visiting Hartford Wolf Pack on Saturday afternoon and then host the Laval Rocket again on Sunday afternoon.
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