In the first of four back-to-back games this season, the Buffalo Bandits (1-1) defense stood their ground and held off a surging Edmonton Rush (0-1) late in the fourth quarter to secure the 9-8 victory Saturday night at the First Niagara Center.
The victory against the Rush tonight not only helps to even out the Bandits regular season record, but also leaves the team in good spirits heading into the bye week after their disappointing loss to New England the night before.
Ryan Benesch led the Bandits to their first victory of the season as he recorded seven points on five goals and two assists. Besides Benesch, both Mark Steenhuis and Dhane Smith had a wonderful evening as well assisting the offense. Steenhuis tallied five points with one goal and four assists while Smith recorded four points with one goal and three assists. Anthony Cosmo was stellar in net tonight as he kept the Rush away from the score sheet with 42 saves in 50 shots in the victory.
Leading the way for the Edmonton Rush this evening were forwards Robert Church and Mark Matthews each tallying two goals and three assists apiece. One particular player of note this evening for the Rush which deserves some attention was the stellar play of the first overall selection from the 2014 NLL entry draft Ben McIntosh. McIntosh proved to the Rush and the rest of the NLL why he was chosen number one with three goals in his debut. Rush starting goaltender Aaron Bold had an uneven performance in net tonight making 31 saves in the loss to the Bandits.
Bandits head coach Troy Cordingley was very pleased this evening with how well the Bandits stood their ground in the face of adversity. During his post-game meeting with the media, Cordingley said, “Defensively, very happy. We communicated really well tonight, made some good switches when they tried to do a couple of plays on us. That’s a key. Offensively I was real happy tonight as well. Last night I wasn’t so happy. It’s a work in progress. We got a long way to go but we’re happy.”
Two minutes after Ryan Benesch got the Bandits on the scoreboard first this evening, Edmonton responded with a three goal run over the next three minutes with goals coming from Corey Small, Robert Church (on the power play after a cross checking penalty assessed to Mitch Wilde) and Mark Matthews. The Edmonton Rush’s defensive core of 2014 NLL defensive player of the year Kyle Rubisch and Chris Corbeil helped to keep the Bandits shooters away from getting some high quality shots for the majority of the first quarter until Joe Resetarits sent a rocket of a shot past Bold’s right side to keep the Bandits within one goal of the Rush’s 3-2 lead.
While the first quarter saw the Rush take control for the first 15 minutes, it was now the Bandits turn to take control for the next 15. After Alex Kedoh Hill recorded his first goal of the season, Ryan Benesch played the rest of the second quarter like a man possessed. In a span of eight minutes, Benesch recorded the natural hat trick when Bandits defender Steve Priolo found him coming off the bench for a shorthanded goal at 2:47, Dhane Smith picked off a pass and found him open wide open for the second goal at 6:21 and when he plowed through the Rush defense and beat Bold low for the third goal at 10:18.
Speaking about his hot streak during the second quarter, Benesch quipped, “Yeah it was okay, I could’ve had a few more but you can’t score them all.”
Benesch’s head coach was also impressed with his command in the second quarter when Cordingley stated, “That’s what good players do. We need a different guy every night and if Ryan wants to do it all year then I’m okay with that too.”
While each team owned a piece of the first half, the third quarter turned out to be a real tug of war that saw neither side relenting to the other. The Bandits began to pull away from the Rush in the beginning of the third when Benesch and Steenhuis padded the Bandits lead by adding two more goals to make it an 8-3 Bandits lead early into the third. Refusing to give up, the Edmonton Rush battled back late in the third when Mark Matthews beat Cosmo over the shoulder and when Edmonton pulled Bold for an extra attacker, McIntosh scored on a quick stick with two seconds remaining in the third to cut into the Bandits lead 9-5.
When the thrill of scoring his first NLL goal wore off for McIntosh, he was definitely hungry for more and looked at the fourth quarter to make his move.
McIntosh came out guns blazing in the fourth and ignited the Rush rally by scoring two goals in the first five minutes and securing his hat trick.
With the Rush now in rally mode and only down two goals in the fourth, the Bandits began to unravel from the pressure and got into serious penalty trouble. Starting at the 4:10 mark and lasting a total of one minute and 25 seconds, Jerome Thompson (slashing), David Brock (five minutes fighting), Brandon Goodwin (two minutes roughing) and Steve Priolo (two minutes slashing/five minute major high sticking) each found their way into the penalty box and eventually had the Bandits playing down a man for the next several minutes.
Leaving the Bandits fate in the hands of Cosmo and the Bandits penalty killers proved to be a risky gamble that surprisingly paid off as the Bandits only surrendered one lone Rush goal from Robert Church and killed off the remaining 6:55 of Priolo’s penalty time giving the Bandits the 9-8 victory.
After the game, Cordingley was thrilled with his penalty killers’ performance in the fourth with, “Those guys that were out there killing that penalty, it was amazing. Billy Dee Smith had one hell of a game, that guy gave us some good time tonight. All the defense; Kevin Brownell is unreal; the kid gets better and better and has had two great games. Kedoh Hill gets every loose ball and that’s what it takes to win.”
Buffalo’s next game will be on January 17 when they head west for a 10 pm showdown with the Vancouver Stealth.
