The first meeting of the Hershey Bears and the Rochester Americans occurred almost 52 years ago on October 28, 1956. The video from that game was not saved for obvious technological reasons, and it’s not likely that anyone would want to engrave tonight’s encounter in their memory. Although the result in both encounters was positive, with Hershey prevailing, Sunday’s game at Giant Center with Hershey coming out on top with a 8-3 win, was not picture perfect.
Before many of the sellout crowd members had taken their seats, the referee, Francis Charron, had awarded a penalty shot to Chris Bourque after a Rochester defender hauled him down as he was approaching net minder Tyler Plante. On the attempt, Bourque effortlessly beat Plante high on the glove side. “I saw he had his glove dropped down way low it was pretty easy to just put it over his glove I had a lot of room,” said Bourque. Bourque’s early tally, combined with Rochester’s inept offense, which had produced only a league-low 13 goals in seven games, seemed to suggest that Hershey was in for an easy night.
Despite numerous chances to increase their lead, the Bears found themselves tied 1-1 after the first period, thanks to a late goal by the Amerks Michael Duco, despite the efforts of Keith Aucoin. Aucoin, who was denied by Plante on two separate occasions, saw a third chance ring off the post. He was also an integral part of a disallowed goal at 14:27, in which the referee ruled that the net was off its moorings.
Forgetting their first period struggles, Hershey got off to a strong start early in the second period. The first strike of the period came at 3:41, when Karl Alzner scored his first professional goal, sliding a rebound under a sprawled Plante, utilizing an impressive skate-to-stick maneuver. When asked his feelings after netting his first professional goal, Alzner answered, “Relief. It was a big one cause I didn’t score my first junior goal until 86 games into the season (career) and to score 8 games into the season is a lot better feeling and also redemption since the night before I had pretty much the exact same play and I messed it up so it was nice to actually bury it this time.”
After Rochester’s Jacob Micflikier scored 1 minute and 11 seconds after Alzner’s goal, Andrew Gordon gave Hershey the lead for good at 12:27. Gordon’s goal, on a busted play, started the momentum rolling in the right direction for the Chocolate and White. “I stayed right around the top of the crease and I’m pretty sure he (Andrew Joudrey) was going to Bourque on the back side and it hit their D man’s skate and just popped to the top of the crease,” Gordon said. “I was right there…I was fortunate enough to be standing still in the right place in the right position.”
Hershey went on the romp from there, with Quintin Laing and Oskar Osala each netting two goals, and Alexandre Giroux adding a single tally to make the final score 8-3. Sunday’s outing, which saw the Bears receive goals from 6 different players, was the third time this season they saw 6 or more players find the back of the net in a single game. Predicted by many to be a dominant force in the AHL, Hershey has shown incredible depth in the short 8 game season. When asked about his expectations for the season and whether he had expected such depth in the goal-scoring department, head coach Bob Woods replied, “I think when we looked at our team, we were pretty happy with our offensive depth here and I think the big thing was just trying to cut down the goals against and I think for the most part we’ve done a good job of that.”