Hershey loses to Lehigh Valley 3-2 in thrilling shoout.
The Hershey Bears hosted the Lehigh Valley Phantoms for the final matchup of the season at The Hershey Giant Center on Sunday evening.
Lehigh Valley would get on the board first with a short-handed breakaway goal scored by Corban Knight at 7:54 in the first period. Riley Barber would find an assist on the first Hershey goal at 16:09, passing to a wide open Joe Whitney. Whitney would find the back of the net, beating John Muse to tie up the game. This would bring Joe Whitney to an impressive twelve points in eleven games, with a total of three goals and nine assists, since joining the chocolate and brown.
Hershey would pull ahead at 4:51 in the second period when Dustin Gazley set Tim McGauley up for an awesome pass to Wayne Simpson. Simpson would get his twelfth goal of the season, as Tim McGauley earned his first professional point with the Hershey Bears. Dustin Gazley would play his four hundredth professional career game, earning his eighteenth assist of the season and one hundred and twentieth career point.
Mikhail Vorobyev would tie the game up at 13:56 in the second period, making it 2-2. The third period would play out scoreless, and when Riley Barber was sent to the box for a tripping call with just over a minute left in the final period, the game would head into a 4 on 3 overtime period. Overtime would play out scoreless as well and over nine thousand fans were eagerly preparing for yet another shootout.
Whitney would impress his new team and fans with the first goal of the shootout, but Corban Knight would answer back forcing another round. At the end of the fifth round Vorobyev would score ending the game 3-2.
Lehigh Valley outshot Hershey 36-24. This would improve the first place Phantoms record to 38-15-3-4 as the Bears dropped to last place with a 24-27-4-5 record in the standings.
The Hershey Bears will be in Syracuse, NY Friday night, March 9, for a 7pm matchup against the Syracuse Crunch. They will find themselves in Binghamton Saturday night, March 10, to take on the Devils at 7pm, then head back home to take on the Grand Rapids Griffins at 5pm on Sunday March 11.
