Syracuse, NY (October 30, 2010) – Crunch center Nick Bonino’s five-game assist streak may have come to an end, but the Hartford, Connecticut native didn’t need any helpers, scoring his first two goals of the season in a 3-2 win over the Albany Devils tonight at the War Memorial at Oncenter.
After a scoreless first 20 minutes in which the Crunch outshot Albany 10-9, it was the Devils who struck first on the power play to take a 1-0 lead just 2:13 into the second period when Vladimir Zharkov barreled his way to the net and slid a rebound past Timo Pielmeier, breaking the Crunch’s streak of 21 straight home penalty kills to start the season.
The Crunch answered with a power play goal of their own just two minutes later when Kyle Palmieri found Bonino camped out on the right side of the crease and he buried the feed past Mike McKenna to knot the score at 1-1.
Palmieri would record a goal himself just 5:43 later when he re-directed a Nicolas Deschamps centering feed after Deschamps made a great move by skating behind the net and pulling a spin-a-rama on his defender in order to sweep the disk to Palmieri on his backhand for the one-timer.
The Crunch took a 3-1 lead just three and a half minutes into the third frame on a great individual effort by Bonino. After losing the face-off, Bonino didn’t give up on the play and capitalized when an Albany defenseman turned the puck over in front of the net and he pounced on it and slapped it by McKenna to give the Crunch a two-goal lead.
Bonino’s second marker stood as the game-winner, as Albany made it interesting late when Mattias Tedenby slipped one by Pielmeier with 54 seconds left in regulation. The Crunch withstood the pressure in the game’s final minute when Albany pulled McKenna for the extra man and hung tough for the victory.
The Crunch embark on a four-game road trip and don’t return home to the War Memorial at Oncenter until Saturday, November 13 against Hershey.
CRUNCHABLES: Bonino is now on a six-game point streak (2g, 5a)…Luca Sbisa extended his point streak to five games (2g, 6a) with an assist tonight…Palmieri also extended his point streak to five games, goal streak to four games and has eight total points (6g, 2a) over that span…The Crunch have scored a power play goal in three straight games and are 7-for-22 (31.8%) with the man-advantage over the last five games.
