The New York Riptide were hoping for better results in the first part of the 2022-23 NLL season, but they find themselves at 0-2 in the East Conference and in last place. They were one goal away from defeating the much talked about San Diego Seals in their opener, but suffered mightily at the hands of the Halifax Thunderbirds this past weekend, falling 20-11.
Eleven goals is pretty decent – and they scored 14 against San Diego – so the offence is there. Really, you can’t fault the defence either. The Riptide have just been unlucky to face two such high-powered teams to open their season.
New York led 3-1 before Halifax broke the game open with five goals in a row to end the first quarter up 6-3.
Larson Sundown’s dunk goal was the highlight of the quarter. It started with a Jeff Teat behind-the-back pass to Reilly O’Connor who found Sundown coming around the net.
In the second, Halifax scored seven to New York’s three. Randy Staats had a hat trick in the period, Ryan Benesch scored goal numbers three and four on the night, and Chris Boushy completed a hat trick.
The Riptide showed signs of life in the third, outscoring Halifax 4-1 to close the gap to 14-10, led by a pair of goals from Teat. Though they were in the perfect position to keep the momentum and take advantage of a rare quiet stretch for the Thunderbirds, Halifax rookie goaltender Drew Hutchison came up big to keep his team ahead.
Boushy scored on the power play 5:27 into the fourth, which was followed by a Clarke Petterson goal 37 seconds later. Reilly O’Connor scored his third goal of the game for New York just over a minute later, but the Thunderbirds kept piling on, scoring four more in the final four minutes of the game and setting a new team record for the most goals scored in a single game.
Benesch led Halifax with five goals and four assists. Staats (4G/4A), Boushy (4G), Cody Jamieson (2G/5A) and Petterson (2G/4A) had massive games. Hutchison finished with 29 saves.
O’Connor (3G/3A), Connor Kearnan (3G/1A) and Teat (2G/5A) led New York. Steven Orleman made 10 saves before being pulled in favour of Gowah Abrams in the second period. Abrams made 26 saves.
New York now has an extended Christmas break, returning to action on Saturday, January 7th, when they host the Toronto Rock (1-2) at Nassau Coliseum. They’ll play a fourth consecutive game at home on Sunday, January 15thbefore their first road contest on January 21st at 7 p.m. in Albany.
