Belleville nets the final 3 goals to pull out a 3-2 win over Rochester.
By CRAIG POTTER / C&C Worldwide Sports Director
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — The Belleville Senators demonstrated why they not only lead the North Division, but also have the most points in the Eastern Conference of the American Hockey League with an overtime, come-from-behind 3-2 victory over the Rochester Americans Wednesday night before 3,783 fans at the Blue Cross Arena.
“I’m not even looking at the overtime, they’re shouldn’t have even been an overtime,” said Amerks coach Chris Taylor. “It’s hard to win games, it’s hard to finish teams off. We weren’t willing to finish that team off.
“We play four lines, there’s no excuse not to have fresh legs. You have a power play (early in the third period)… you have no shots on it.”
The Amerks dominated the first period as they outshot the Senators, 13-1, through 19 minutes but only led 1-0.
“We have to be willing to finish teams off,” Taylor said. “As hard as it is to win games, it is even harder to finish them off. We did not finish off plays and we let them back into the game.”
“I thought we came out strong,” said Jean-Sebastien Dea. “We seemed to think it was maybe going to be an easy game, but we have to play a full 60-minute game. At times lately we have not been able to play a full 60 whether it be a slow start or finishing the game. It’s something that we need to regroup and get better moving forward.”
Dea scored his team-high 15th goal, off assists from Zach Redmond and Taylor Leier, to give Rochester the 1-0 lead.
Belleville registered just one shot, by Erik Brannstrom at 7:35, in the first 19 minutes of the opening stanza. The Senators posted 2 shots in the final minute of the period.
“I think that’s what we have to work on, playing a full 60 minutes,” Dea said. “We either don’t start strong or don’t finish strong.”
Rookie defenseman Jacob Bryson recorded his first professional goal midway through the second period for a 2-0 Rochester advantage.
“It took nearly 50 games but it does feel good,” said Bryson. “It was a set play off the face-off. ‘Aspie’ (Rasmus Asplund) made a great pass and all I really had to do was put the puck on net. It was a great feeling.”
“It’s nice to see him get rewarded finally,” said Taylor. “Jacob is one of those guys who is very good defensively, but over the last 10 games or so he has had a lot of really good offensive chances. I am very happy for him.”
The Amerks, however, were unable to close out the game as the Senators took just 4 shots on rookie goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, and scored on 2 of them to tie the game and send it into overtime.
“We did not play a 60-minute game,” said Amerks team captain Kevin Porter. “We let up a little bit and they picked it up and took it to us in the third period. To get two points out of this game would have been huge.”
Josh Norris ended the game in 1:12 of the extra session with his second tally of the contest for the victory.
“He’s a game-changer for sure,” Taylor said of Norris.
“Tonight was a big game,” Bryson added. “They have a lot of young talented forwards. That’s the team to beat right now.”
*NOTES — The Amerks need just one more win to reach the 30-win mark for the fourth consecutive season and third straight under head coach Chris Taylor. With the team’s next win, Taylor will become the first Amerks head coach since Randy Cunneyworth, the all-time winningest coach in franchise history, to lead his team to 30 or more wins in each of his first three seasons behind the bench…Jean-Sebastien Dea, who remains the only Amerk this season to reach the 30-point plateau, continues to pace the team in goals (14) and points (33) through 47 games…
Rookie defenseman Jacob Bryson is tied for 11th among all first-year defensemen with a plus-6 rating. Bryson is also eighth among all rookies with 18 assists in 51 games…The Senators lineup features two former Amerk defensemen in Jack Dougherty and Stuart Percy.