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AHL Syracuse Crunch

Crunch Edge Portland

March 6, 2010 - American Hockey League (AHL)
Syracuse Crunch News Release


Syracuse, NY - The Syracuse Crunch held off a furious third period rally after jumping out to a four-goal lead, squeezing out a 4-3 win over the Portland Pirates in front of 5,526 fans tonight at the War Memorial at Oncenter.

Portland roared back from four goals down heading into the third with three markers in a span of 9:19. The third goal came with their goalie pulled and just over a minute remaining on the clock. The Pirates thought they tied the game in the final seconds, but Kevin Lalande dove across the goal line to stop the puck as the horn sounded to preserve the victory.

The Crunch opened the game's scoring just five and a half minutes into the game on a 5-on-3 after Portland's Nathan Gerbe was called for slashing at 3:59 and Marc-Andre Gragnani went for cross-checking at the 5:16 mark.

Chad Kolarik notched his second point in as many games with the Crunch when he picked up an assist by dishing the disk back to Brendan Bell at the point and the Ottawa, Ontario native rifled a shot that beat Jhonas Enroth clean to the glove side to put Syracuse up 1-0.

The Crunch jumped out to a 2-0 lead for the second straight game 10 minutes later when Nick Holden fired a shot from the left point that found its way through Enroth.

Portland held the advantage in first period shots, but Lalande denied all 12 bids the Pirates threw his way.

The Crunch extended their lead to 3-0 at the 9:35 mark of the second when Bell's wrister hit a Portland defenseman in front, fluttered up in the air and over the goal line.

Syracuse coasted to a 4-0 advantage with six seconds remaining in the stanza when Jonathan Sigalet stepped up at the point and threw a wrister towards the goal that was perfectly re-directed by Jared Aulin through the legs of Enroth.

Portland head coach Kevin Dineen pulled his starter in favor of backup J.P. Lamoureux to start the third period.

Dineen's club seemed to gain momentum after that, picking up steam in the game's final 20 minutes.

Mike Weber's tally at the 9:33 mark made it a 4-1 game until Philip Gogulla scored twice in a one-minute, seven-second span to make it 4-3 with 1:08 left on the clock.

A goal mouth scramble ensued in the game's final seconds, but the Crunch hung on for the win.

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