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AHL Syracuse Crunch

Crunch Skid Hits Seven

December 17, 2008 - American Hockey League (AHL)
Syracuse Crunch News Release


Grand Rapids, MI (December 17, 2008) - The Syracuse Crunch once again could not overcome an early deficit, as two power play goals against and 11 penalties helped to do them in as they fell to the Grand Rapids Griffins by a 5-1 score at Van Andel Arena tonight. The loss extends the Crunch's season-high overall and road losing streaks to seven games.

The Crunch did not get off to the start they wanted when defenseman Grant Clitsome was called for hooking only 1:23 into the game.

Just 58 seconds later, the Griffins made it 1-0 when Darren Haydar's blast from the point found the back of the net through a screened Dan LaCosta, making his first start since missing three games with a back injury.

Grand Rapids did not let up and went up by a 2-0 count at the 9:42 mark of the first. Aaron Downey connected on a home run pass to Darren Helm, who split the Crunch defense up the middle and put a shot past LaCosta.

The Griffins outshot the Crunch by a 17-7 margin in the period.

The bad breaks continued for Syracuse as the Griffins took a 3-0 lead when Mattias Ritola found a wide open Francis Pare in front of the net who punched the puck past LaCosta at the 12:12 mark of the second.

The Crunch answered back and got back to within two goals just 12 seconds later though, as Mike York tallied his seventh of the campaign off a feed from Derek MacKenzie to make it 3-1.

Syracuse had a golden opportunity to close the gap to 3-2 late in the second, but Grand Rapids broke in on a shorthanded 2-on-1 and Ville Leino snuck one by LaCosta on the backhand to extend Grand Rapids' lead to 4-1. Shots were 25-16 in favor of the Griffins after two.

The Crunch could not get anything going offensively in the third period and October AHL Rookie of the Month Justin Abdelkader fired a slapper over the shoulder of LaCosta to make it a 5-1 game with just under five minutes to play.

CRUNCHABLES: The Crunch let up the first goal for the fourth straight game tonight...Dan LaCosta has given up three or more goals in each of his last four starts...Left wing Mark Bomersback made his Crunch debut...The Crunch have scored 31 goals in 17 road games...Syracuse dropped to 0-6-0-0 in the month of December...Syracuse native Jimmy Howard was between the pipes for Grand Rapids tonight.

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