The Knighthawks celebrated Hall of Fame Night tonight by defeating the Calgary Roughnecks, 12-11 at Connors & Ferris Field at The Blue Cross. With former players looking on, Cody Jamieson scored the game-winner with 3:48 to play to extend Rochester’s winning streak to four games.
The game was a rematch of the 2014 NLL Championship Series and it once again featured a late Matt Vinc save to preserve a one-goal Rochester lead. The Knighthawks improved to 6-3 with the home win.
On offense, Jamieson led the way with seven points (3+4), while Dan Dawson and Joel Matthews each notched one-goal, three-assist efforts. Cory Vitarelli (2+1) and Joe Walters (2+1) chipped three-point performances.
Rochester came out firing with six first quarter goals. Walters started the run followed by Vitarelli, who put a beautiful behind-the-back goal past Calgary goaltender Frankie Scigliano. Jamieson finished off the first Knighthawks’ run with a power-play goal before Calgary put Mike Poulin in goal. Daryl Veltman got the Roughnecks on the board, but Matthews set up yet another Knighthawks run to make it 6-1 going into the second.
Dawson opened up the second quarter with a beautiful goal to dunk it in behind the net and give the Knighthawks their largest lead of the game, 7-1. The Roughnecks fought back for the remainder of the period to close out the second down by two.
In the third, Calgary put up two early goals but Walters silenced the run with a bullet to regain the Knighthawks lead. Point followed suit with his first of the night, firing it past Poulin to extend the Knighthawks’ lead to 9-7. Rochester’s 10th goal came from Self, who scored a perfect breakaway goal. Calgary got one back before the end of the quarter to make it 10-8 going into the fourth.
Jamieson opened and closed out the scoring in the fourth quarter. His first goal trickled past Poulin to give the Knighthawks an 11-9 lead. Calgary would tie the game up with less than 10 minutes left in the frame and it would remain tied until just under four left to play. Jamieson then notched his third of the night at11:12. With 24 seconds left in the game and a Calgary possession, the Knighthawks defense was able to hold back the Roughnecks and secure the win.
