Rock Offence Stalls In 11-6 Loss
SAN DIEGO, CA – The San Diego Seals delivered an 11-6 Game 2 win over the Toronto Rock in front of their fans at Pechanga Arena in San Diego, CA to force a third and deciding game in the Best-of-3 NLL Semifinals series back in Rock City on Saturday night at TD Coliseum in Hamilton, ON.
“We clearly weren’t good enough in any area to come on the road and close out a hungry team,” said Rock Head Coach Matt Sawyer. “We need to be much better from start to finish in all areas.”
Challen Rogers opened the scoring for the Rock just 1:17 into the opening quarter put the Rock on the board. However, that was only time the Rock led in this game and Toronto would not score again until Chris Boushy dented the twine with 6:05 left in the third quarter. That added up to 37:38 without a goal and by that time San Diego led 7-2. The Seals added one more before the end of the third frame to lead 8-2.
While the Rock did outscore the Seals in the fourth quarter 4-3, tempers flared down the stretch and several Rock players were ushered to the locker room before the final buzzer.
Cameron Dunkerley tended goal for the San Diego Seals with their starter Chris Origlieri moved to the Injured Reserve List earlier on game day. Dunkerley made 36 saves on just 42 Rock shots fired his way.
Rock netminder Nick Rose stopped 34 of 43 Seals shots in 51 minutes of work before giving way to Troy Holowchuk who was responsible for making the run to the bench during 6-on-5 situations down the stretch. Holowchuk stopped 7 of 8 shots he faced. The Seals also had an empty net goal.
The Rock power play was 0-for-5 and while you never want to fail to score on the man advantage, any power play strike at any time in this low scoring contest could have swung some momentum in the Rock’s direction. San Diego was 2-for-7 on the man up.
“We lost it up front,” said Rogers. “Our D was playing great as usual and we just weren’t going to the areas that we have success with and it was evident. We weren’t getting quality looks because we weren’t getting to the quality areas and then frustration boils over. It’s do or die next weekend and we’ve been good in bounce back games.”
Next weekend, the best-of-3 NLL Semifinals series will wrap up with Game 3 on Saturday night at 7:00pm at TD Coliseum in Hamilton. The winner of the game will advance to the NLL Cup Finals against either Halifax or Georgia.
Tickets for Saturday’s NLL Semifinals Game 3 vs. San Diego are on sale now.
For more information on Toronto Rock tickets, please contact a Toronto Rock account executive by phone at 905-426-4744, by email at tickets@torontorock.com or visit torontorock.com.
