Mitch Love shares the "love" with the Crunch's Kevin Harvey
I wasn’t feeling too confident about the Aeros chances coming into tonight’s game against the Syracuse Crunch. Their offense had just been recalled to Minnesota. And the Crunch had just lost to San Antonio, and I thought they would be looking for a little revenge.
Well, it turns out the Crunch did try to take out some anger on the Aeros, but they did it by slamming goalie Barry Brust into the wall and playing a physical brand of hockey. The Aeros, however, got the win. A 4-3 win before 5,685 fans at Toyota Center, made even more impressive because of the absence of not only Krys Kolanos, but of Ryan Hamilton, Brian Lundbohm, and Clayton Stoner.
As has been the case with the Aeros this season, they fell behind, with Syracuse scoring at 17:28 of the first period then going up 2-0 at 9:18 of the second. But then Corey Locke, perhaps feeling a bit pissed because it was Kolanos, and not himself going up to Minnesota, got free on a breakaway and scored at 10:17 of the second to make the score 2-1. Then Jesse Schultz and Locke fed Tomas Mojzis who fired a slap shot from atop the left red circle on the power play to tie the game at 12:03 of the second. And about four minutes later, and also on the power play, Maxim Noreau fired a shot from about the same spot as Mojzis to put the Aeros up 3-2.
But anyone who has seen the Aeros this year knows, giving the Aeros a lead in the third period is not a good thing. This has become a team that can’t hold the lead. “Last year we hardly ever came from behind and hardly ever gave up a lead,” coach Kevin Constantine said after the game. “And this year we give up leads and come from behind.”
But they didn’t give up the lead. Not this time.
Corey Locke broke free for another breakaway in the third, putting the Aeros up 4-2 at 6:54 of the third, and the Aeros kept the pressure on the Crunch the rest of the way. The Crunch scored a 6x5 goal at the 19:42 mark to make it 4-3, but they never threatened the Aeros in the third period.
“It was really important tonight to have a lead in the third and win the game,” Constantine said. “Really important.”
And win they did, making their record for the season 11-10-1-2, 25 points. They’re still in sixth place in the West Division, but they’re still only five points out of first place. They next play the Rochester Americans, in Houston, on Wednesday night.
SOME MISCELLANEOUS GAME NOTES:
The Aeros were outshot 43-29 by the Crunch, yet still won the game. And while Corey Locke had a little to do with the final score, the ultimate credit for the win has to go to goalie Barry Brust. “It took us while to get going,” Constantine said. “And Barry was great to hold us in that game. Just great.”
He faced 16 shots in each of the first two periods and 11 shots in the third. But Barry, being Barry, placed the credit for the win on his teammates. “The boys bailed me out tonight.”
Brust also likes physical games. Especially when he gets the chance to get physical along with his teammates. And he got to crunch a few of the Crunch. But at one point, Brust was the one who got crunched when he got knocked to the ice by Syracuse’s Craig MacDonald at 19:05 of the first while trying to the play the puck in the trapezoid. The resulting scrum found McDonald sent to the box for goaltender interference and the Crunch’s Alexandre Picard given a four minute double minor for roughing along with a ten minute penalty for misconduct. Justin Falk and Jason Ryzner each got two minute roughing penalties.
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One would think that, after stopping 40 of 43 shots – the most shots surrendered by the Aeros this year – that Barry Brust would have been the number one star of the game. One would think wrong as Brust was only the second star of the game.
The number one star was Locke who had three points for the night, two goals and an assist. Locke’s night was impressive. It was like he was on a mission to prove to the Wild that he should be up in Minnesota, and not Kolanos. And if he keeps playing like he did tonight, he might prove his point.
But still, Brust should have been the number one star.
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On the injury front…
Ryan Hamilton is suffering from a mild concussion and will probably be out another ten days or so. Brian Lundbohm is suffering from a groin injury. And Clayton Stoner was scratched because of a lower body injury – to me, that’s code for his annual back injury. Paul Albers appears to have been a healthy scratch.
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On a personal note. I've read some criticism of some of the language I use in this blog. First, it's my blog, and I'll cuss if I want to. Secondly, I hope these complainers bitch to the Aeros every time they'll bust out the "bullshit" portion of the "Cotton-Eyed Joe," which they do multiple times a game.
1 comment:
Welcome back to blogging, John. I wish you'd let me know that you'd gotten back to it.
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