GAME PREVIEW: AMERKS CLOSE OUT TWO-GAME SET TONIGHT IN BELLEVILLE
Mar 2, 2024TONIGHT'S GAME OVERVIEW
The Rochester Americans (24-19-6-2) conclude the first weekend of March in a rematch with the Belleville Senators (27-21-2-3) tonight at 7:00 p.m. All the action from CAA Arena will be carried live on The Sports Leader 95.7 FM/950 AM The Fan Rochester as well as AHLTV.
The Amerks, who have points in 12 of their last 18 games, currently sit in fourth place in the AHL’s North Division standings, just one ahead the Toronto Marlies and one back of the third-place Senators. The club has one game in hand on Belleville, which entered Friday having won four straight.
Belleville has earned the win in seven of its previous 13 games since the start of February. Starting with a 4-1 victory last Wednesday night, the Senators have won four of five, outscoring the opposition 14-8 in that span.
HEAD-TO-HEAD RESULTS AGAINST BELLEVILLE
Dating back to the 2021-22 season, forward Michael Mersch has recorded 16 points (7+9) in 17 career games against Belleville. The Amerks captain has notched at least one point and one shot in 12 of his 17 games versus the Senators.
Since Belleville entered the league ahead of the 2017-18 season, Rochester has an all-time record of 17-20-2 against the Senators. The Amerks have posted a .500 winning percentage or better in four of the first five seasons in the head-to-head series.
Both teams have outscored the opposition in the first period this season while being outscored in the second stanza.
LAST TIME OUT
The Amerks stormed out to a commanding 4-0 lead in the second period and never looked back on their way to a 4-1 victory over Belleville in the first of back-to-back meetings between the North Division rivals Friday night.
Zach Metsa (0+2) logged his second multi-point game of the season for the Amerks. Tyson Jost, Aleksandr Kisakov, Brett Murray and Lukas Rousek each one goal while Linus Weissbach, Isak Rosen, and Jiri Kulich all tallied an assist.
Goaltender Devon Levi (7-4-3) made his 12th start in the last 15 games since being reassigned to Rochester on Jan. 20. The rookie netminder made 30 saves to earn his seventh win of the slate and chipped in offensively, earning his first pro point with an assist on the game-winning goal.
THE BEST OFFENSE IS A GOOD DEFENSE
Jeremy Davies and Kale Clague are among the AHL’s top scoring defensemen, having combined for 11 goals and 45 points this season.
Davies, who had points in three straight games for the second time this season since closing out the month of October on a five-game point streak, scored his eighth goal of the year in last Monday’s 2-1 overtime win at Toronto. He enters tonight tied for 10th in goals by a defenseman and remains on pace to match the career-high 11 he scored last season. He’s never gone more than four straight games without a point.
Back from a three-game stint with the Buffalo Sabres, Clague is tied for 23rd among all blueliners with 20 assists. With two assists at Utica back on Feb. 14, he has reached the 20-assist mark for the second time in his career and has eclipsed the 20-point mark for the third time since his rookie campaign.
ROUSEK RACKING UP THE POINTS
Lukas Rousek has been one of the team’s most consistent point-getters since the turn of 2024, having recorded points in 16 of 23 games in that stretch while also producing 22 points over his last 29 games since Dec. 20.
Rousek, a sixth-round selection (160th overall) by the Sabres in the 2019 NHL Draft, currently leads the team with 28 assists and 38 points while his 10 goals are tied for six. Among all Amerks who have appeared in at least 30 games, he is tops in points per game (0.81).
The third-year pro and AHL All-Star saw his career-long point streak come to an end on Jan. 26, stopping at 13 games. He totaled 14 points between Dec. 20 and Jan. 20, the second-longest point streak in the league behind only Toronto’s Alex Steeves, who had a point in 16 straight games.
Rousek’s point streak was the longest by an Amerk in 24 years since Hall of Famer Domenic Pittis had points in 14 straight contests from Jan. 22 to March 4 during the 1999-2000 campaign.
NEW YEAR, NEW NEUCHEV
After producing just five points in his first 23 games, rookie foward Viktor Neuchev has unsurprisingly emerged as Rochester’s top scoring rookie through the middle of February.
Dating back to Dec. 29 and the turn of the New Year, Neuchev has erupted for 13 points on five goals and eight assists over his previous 16 games.
Neuchev has recorded at least one point in eight games over that span, including a season-long six-game point streak from Dec. 29 to Jan. 20 which saw him score three goals and record eight points.
Buffalo’s third-round selection (74th overall) in 2022, Neuchev’s most impressive performance of the season came back on Jan. 27, finding the back of the net for the third time in four games with the game-winning goal while also adding two assists in the 7-4 win over Laval. Since Jan. 5, Neuchev has recorded four multi-point games, which includes a pair of three-point efforts.
Of Neuchev’s seven goals this season, five have been scored on home ice and three have come against Laval. Neuchev, who had a 40-goal season while playing for Russia’s junior league during the 2021-22 campaign, currently leads all Amerks rookies with 19 points (7+12) and 57 shots in 38 games.
WORKING OVERTIME
Last Saturday’s 2-1 overtime loss in Hershey was the third game over the last seven for Rochester that went beyond regulation, all of which finished in a 2-1 score. Overall, the Amerks have gone to extra time on 18 different occasions, the most by any team this season, including each of the first three games of the campaign.
Four of the last seven games against Syracuse have required extra time to determine a winner, including each of the last three which saw the Crunch overcome a pair of 2-0 deficits before defeating Rochester in overtime on back-to-back nights.
Four of Jiri Kulich’s team-high five game-winning goals this season have come by way of overtime while Isak Rosen, Brandon Biro and Jeremy Davies have each netted the clinching goal during the extra frame.
Never before in the near 68-year history of the franchise have the Amerks opened a season with three consecutive overtime contests.
Of Rochester’s 12 games in February, five were decided past regulation. The club was 1-3 in overtime in the month and showed an 0-1 record in the shootout.
Dating back to Jan. 20 of last season, 28 of Rochester’s previous 90 regular-season games have required overtime to determine a winner. Of the Amerks 40 wins during that same span, 14 have come came following the end of regulation.
The Amerks show a 7-6 record in overtime this season and are 3-2 in the shootout. Rochester tied an AHL record with 29 overtime games in 2017-18, showing a 9-11 record in overtime and 3-6 in the shootout.
LEANING ON LEVI
Devon Levi has earned the start in 12 of the last 15 games since being reassigned to Rochester on Jan. 20, including five straight to open the month of February. He enters the weekend having won four of his last seven and six of his last 10.
Levi, who boasts a 7-4-3 record in 14 appearances with the Amerks, totaled 130 saves on 136 shots he faced over his recent three-game win streak, boasting an impressive 1.95 goals-against average and a .956 save percentage over that span.
His career-high 52 saves in last Monday’s overtime win at Toronto were the most by an Amerks goaltender since Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen had 54 in a 2-1 win at Syracuse on Feb. 25, 2022.
Levi, who ranks 12th among rookie netminders with a 2.49 goals-against average, has held the opposition to three or fewer goals in 11 of his 14 starts. He’s 7-1-3 this season in those games.
Levi won the Mike Richter Award, given annually to the top goaltender in men’s college hockey, for the second straight year following the 2022-23 season.
The only two-time winner in the award’s history, Levi led the nation again with a .933 save percentage, and tied for third in both shutouts (6) and saves (1,183).
TOKARSKI ON THE MOVE
Veteran goaltender Dustin Tokarski, who missed the first eight games of the season due to an injury he sustained in training camp, made his season debut back on Nov. 3 against Utica.
In doing so, the two-time Calder Cup winner and AHL All-Star became just the 18th goaltender in league history to play in 400 career games, a list that also includes former Amerks Bobby Perreault (512), Michael Leighton (507), Drew MacIntyre (440) and Ed Chadwick (417).
Tokarski, who’s in his second stint with the Amerks and 10th different AHL franchise, went 1-1-0 during a brief two-game stint with Rochester as part of the COVID-shortnened 2020-21 campaign. He went 12-20-7 in 42 appearances with the Buffalo Sabres from 2021-23.
Currently in his 15th season, he joins Marcel Paille and Michael Leighton as the only goaltenders all-time to play at least 15 seasons in the AHL.
Tokarski, who’s 7-7-3 in his first 18 appearances, surpassed the 10,000-save mark for his AHL career following a 31-save effort against Utica on Nov. 10. He also reached the 12,000-save mark for his pro career the week prior when he made his season debut against the Comets.
Entering tonight, the 34-year-old Tokarski, who currently is six wins away from tying Red Almas for 11th all-time in career wins (218). He’s also two games away from tying Neil Little for 15th all-time (419) and will tie Yann Danis for eighth all-time on his next shutout.
A (JOB)ST WELL DONE
Amerks forward Mason Jobst enters tonight with 20 points (9+11) over his last 21 games, the most by an Amerk since the turn of the new year. Jobst, who appeared in his 200th professional game at Utica on Feb. 14, recorded a career-best three-assist outing on Feb. 16 against Wilkes-Barre/Scranton and followed that up by scoring goals in three straight games, including his career-high 16th goal of the season last Friday night against Belleville.
After closing out the 2022-23 campaign with career-highs in all offensive categories, the fifth-year forward has already surpassed his goal total in 18 fewer games this season. Jobst, who is the second Amerk this season to reach the 30-point mark, is second on the team in goals (16) and points (35) while his 19 assists are second-most amongst all Rochester forwards.
In 206 career games, all in the American Hockey League with Rochester, San Jose, Bridgeport, and Binghamton, the Ohio State product has notched 45 goals and 66 assists for 111 points.
SERIES NOTABLES
Devon Levi earned his first win as an Amerk in his American Hockey League debut at Belleville back on Dec. 1. The rookie netminder stopped 40 of 42 through regulation and overtime before turning aside all four Senators shooters in the skills competition. He’s appeared in four games against Belleville this season, boasting a 2-2-0 record with a .923 save percentage.
Including four of the first five games this season versus Belleville, Rochester has scored 11 first-period goals dating back to start the 2022-23 campaign. The Amerks have scored in seven of the last 13 first periods during that span. Belleville (14) has scored in all but four first periods over that same stretch.
In 33 of the last 39 meetings between the two teams dating back to the 2017-18 season, the Amerks have scored two or more goals while Belleville has found the back of the net in all but two games during the stretch. There has been just one shutout over the previous 39 games with Rochester coming up on the wrong side of a 2-0 score on Feb. 7, 2018.
Amerks captain Michael Mersch enters tonight having played 200 games with Rochester since joining the club during the 2020-21 campaign. Mersch, who has 144 points (60+84) with the Amerks, Friday night he became the 58th forward in franchise history to skate in at least 200 games. On his next goal, it would be the ninth time Mersch has recorded double figures in his career ,where he has skated in at least 30 games.