Syracuse, NY- The Syracuse Crunch allowed five unanswered goals by the St. John's IceCaps, falling 5-4 in overtime tonight at the War Memorial Arena.
The Crunch gained a point bringing their season total to 43, good for first place in the Eastern Conference but the loss drops their overall record to 19-7-2-3.
The Crunch carried a two-goal lead into the first intermission thanks to goals from Cory Conacher and Alex Killorn during the final five minutes of the period. Conacher beat St. John's goaltender Eddie Pasquale from the right crease, assisted by PC Labrie and Mark Barberio, with 4:10 to play and Killorn added a power-play goal, assisted by Evan Oberg, with 1:35 to play.
Defenseman Keith Aulie extended the Crunch lead to 3-0 with a low shot off a pass from Killorn 5:20 into the second period. Vlad Namestnikov made it 4-0 on the power play with his first professional goal, a one-timer off a drop pass from Brett Connolly at the 7:40 mark.
St. John's halted the Crunch's momentum, scoring their first goal of the game less than a minute later. Center Eric O'Dell knocked a rebound past Crunch netminder Riku Helenius to put the IceCaps on the board at the 8:31 mark. St. John's defenseman Paul Postma cut the Crunch lead in half with a shot from the blue line bringing the score to 4-2 at the end of the second period.
IceCaps left wing Jason Gregoire scored 1:53 into the final frame and defenseman Will O'Neill scored with 12:28 left to tie the game and force overtime.
Ben Chiarot scored the IceCaps fifth unanswered goal with 20 seconds remaining in overtime to give the IceCaps a 5-4 victory.
Crunchables: Cory Conacher and Alex Killorn each scored their 12th goal of the season in the first period… Prior to tonight Keith Aulie's last goal was on Oct. 21…Cory Conacher registered his first career Gordie Howe hat trick tonight…With two power - play goals tonight the Crunch have scored 11 goals on the man-advantage in their last six games.
