Lawson Comes Up Big As B-Sens Rout Crunch

The B-Sens got some steady goaltending and timely offense as they roll over the Syracuse Crunch 6-2 at the Onondaga County War Memorial Arena on Friday Night. Nathan Lawson made 40 saves and first star honors as he continues his steady play right from the gate this season. Mike Hoffman had a pair of goals and Chris Wideman added three assists as the Sens made the most of their game total 20 shots count. Some solid forechecking and steady defense helped as Bingo improves to 3-1 this season. The Sens and Crunch rematch is set in Binghamton on Saturday Night.

GAME RE-CAP

-1st period

Senators have a strong start to the game as both teams exchanged pp goals in the period. Hoffman started it off for Bingo with a nice wrister to beat Syracuse netminder Cedrick Desjardins glove side on a five on three pp to take a 1-0 lead. Assists went to Wideman and Mika Zibanejad at 7:05. ‘Cuse got their game going and controlled the second half of the period and scored with Mark Borowiecki in the box for holding. Vladislav Namestnikov scored his 2nd of the season with a shot from the goal line that banked off of Lawson’s pad’s and into the net to tie things up at one at 16:42. Nikita Kucherov and Matt Taormina with the assists. Shots are 7-6 Crunch.

-2nd period

Syracuse gets on the board first with another pp goal at the 8:18 mark as Namestnikov found Kucherov all alone near the circle to beat Lawson cleanly for a 2-1 Crunch lead. Then the Sens get things rolling with three unanswered goals in the period. Matt Puempel passed to an open in the middle Buddy Robinson for a big one timer blast from about 40 feet out past Desjardins at 9:43. Exactly one minute later Ben Blood scored his first of the season with a slapper that tipped off a Crunch defender and into the net. Hoffman scored his second of the game with a turnover by Dmitry Korobov to beat Desjardins blocker side for a 4-2 Senators lead. That forced Syracuse to use their timeout as the Sens scored three goals on eight shots in the period. Lawson made some key saves and has played solid including a beautiful kick save on a two on one. Total through two ‘Cuse leads Bingo 29-14 in shots.

-3rd period

Andre Petersson scored his second of the season at 4:43 mark with Wideman and Zibjanejad adding the assists. Sens playing good forechecking and shutting down any threat by Syracuse. Later in the period, Puempel sealed the game as he scored his first of the season on a beautiful feed from Stephane Da Costa to beat Desjardins short side for a 6-2 lead at 14:11. Lawson was strong in net stopping several great saves as the Crunch couldn’t solve Nate. Crunch out shoot the Sens 42-20.

NOTES

– Darren Kramer got the start and that seemed to help keep the physical style of Syracuse at bay. I hope he plays every game we see the Crunch this season.

– Lawson improves to 3-0 in four games and has a sparkling 1.62 GAA and 0.946 good for eighth spot in the AHL. (His one game mop up duty in Norfolk loss went against Andrew Hammond.)

– Sens scored five unanswered goals. It’s apparent they like to score in bunches as this team’s talent just continues to progress. Almost perfect season except for that one big mess in the game at Norfolk.

– Boro had four minors called against him, one resulting in a goal. That’s not his game but perhaps he wanted to send a message to Syracuse for that hit opening night that ended his night. Wasn’t his best effort tonight.

– Derek Grant got the deserving call up by Ottawa earlier in the day as Wacey Hamilton wore the ‘A’.

– Da Costa hasn’t missed a beat for Binghamton as he cleared waivers earlier in the day and had a great game tonight.

3 STARS OF THE GAME

#1 Lawson (40 saves)

#2 Hoffman (2 goals)

#3 Namestnikov (1g 1a)

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HIGHLIGHTS

Next Game: Saturday Night vs.  Syracuse