The Syracuse Crunch looked to follow up their win against the Belleville Senators on Friday with a win against one of the best teams in the AHL, the Hershey Bears. Due to some trades and injuries the Crunch weren’t quite at a fully operational status on Saturday. Brandon Halverson was in net due to Hugo Alnefelt starting on Friday and Matt Tomkins not available for the game. Halverson gave them a shot to win with 16 saves on 19 shots, but the offense just wasn’t there.
Gabriel Fortier opened the scoring in the first period with his 10th goal of the season with Max Groshev and Ilya Usau picking up the assists.
Unfortunately, that would be it in the goalscoring department as Hershey scored the next four goals. Old friend Jimmy Hunnington had a goal and an assist while Riley Sutter scored twice. Clay Stevenson stopped 15 of 16 shots for the win.
The loss, coupled with a win by Cleveland, dropped the Crunch out of first place in the North Division. According to the league’s playoff primer Syracuse’s magic number to clinch a playoff spot sits at 15. Meanwhile, Hershey became the first team in the league to clinch a spot in the postseason.
Neither of the Crunch’s deadline pick-ups, Quinn Schmiemann or Jordy Bellerive, were available for the game. Captain Gabriel Dumont also missed the game due to an injury. Gage Goncalves skated in his 200th AHL game and had one shot on goal. The 23-year-old has 135 points (40 goals, 95 assists) over the 3+ seasons he’s been in Syracuse.
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