Rush rally falls short against Knighthawks in NLL clash

Rochester prevails 13-10 over Saskatchewan

Cody Jamieson (#88) fires a pass to a Knighthawks teammate.

    In the face of defeat, Saskatchewan Rush captain Chris Corbeil didn’t lose his sense of humour.

    Following the Rush’s 13-10 setback to the Rochester Knighthawks on Saturday night at the SaskTel Centre, Corbeil emerged from the dressing room for a post-game scrum and joked with the throng of assembled local media that the team must have lost, because he was needed. 

    The Oakville, Ont.,  product gave a few lighthearted jabs that the media always request the guys that are the big goal scorers, when the Rush win, which is what the National Lacrosse League franchise has done a lot of in about the past nine years dating back to its time in Edmonton.

    When the Rush lose, Corbeil noted with a sly smile he has to come and speak his mind.

    Even with Saturday’s defeat, the Rush still sit first overall in the Western Division and the entire NLL with an 11-3 record. When the laughter died down and Corbeil became serious, he said he was disappointed with what transpired on Saturday before 14,811 spectators.

Knighthawks F Joe Resetarits, right, eludes Rush captain Chris Corbeil.

    His club dropped both encounters with the Knighthawks this season including a 16-11 setback in Rochester back on Feb. 17.

    “We watched what they did in previous weeks and had success against us in the past, and we knew what to expect,” said Corbeil. “That is what they did.

    “We game planned for them. We dropped the ball entirely. They were scoring goals the way we knew they would try to, and they were playing defence the way we expected them to.

    “Our defence, there is no excuse. We knew what they were going to do, and they did it to us. We dropped the ball.”

Knighthawks F Austin Shanks, left, fakes out Rush T Adrian Sorichetti.

    The Knighthawks jumped out to an early 3-0 lead and held a 7-5 edge at halftime. At the 2:48 mark of the fourth quarter, the visitors’ edge grew to 11-6.

    Rush head coach and general manager Derek Keenan said his squad wasn’t strong enough defensively on Saturday.

    “We didn’t play our game on the back end, and we gave them way too many quality chances,” said Keenan. “We just didn’t play hard enough at times. We didn’t play consistent enough at times.”

    The Rush stormed back with a four-goal surge capped by a snipe from forward Robert Church to cut the Knighthawks lead to 11-10 with 4:46 to play in the fourth quarter. Church led the Rush in scoring with four goals and two assists.

    With 3:25 to play in the fourth quarter, the Rush took a bad substitution penalty for too many men. On the ensuing power play, forward Cory Vitarelli scored to put the Knighthawks up 12-10 with 2:51 to play in the fourth quarter.

The Original 16 Crush Dance Team performs on Saturday night.

    Rochester forward Austin Shanks scored into an empty-net with under a minute to play in the fourth quarter to round out the win for the visitors. The empty-net tally was the fifth goal of the night for Shanks.

    “I thought to be honest we did a good job with a late comeback and kind of pushed things,” said Corbeil. “Too many men at the end there obviously was a bit of a back breaker.

    “We should be able to play in all situations with the lead, from behind. To be quite frank, we haven’t done a great job playing with a lead or playing from behind is now evident.

    “This team has to figure out. We are on top of the division and on top of the league right now, but we’re not playing our best lacrosse and there are only four games left.”

The SaskTel Centre crowd gets into the Rush comeback attempt.

    Ben McIntosh scored twice for the Rush, while Jeff Shattler, Corbeil, Mark Matthews and Ryan Keenan all picked up singles.

    Joe Resetarits had two goals and five assists to lead the Knighthawks in scoring. Eric Fannell had a hat trick for Rochester, while Kyle Jackson and Scott Campbell had singles. Cody Jamieson collected five assists for the Knighthawks.

    Evan Kirk stopped 40-of-52 shots to take the setback in goal for the Rush.

    Matt Vinc made 43 saves to pick up the win in goal for the Knighthawks. Rochester improved to 7-7 to stay a half-game behind the Toronto Rock (7-7) for first place in the Eastern Division.

    “They did a good job of keeping us out of the middle I thought,” said Derek Keenan. “At times when we did get good looks, (Matt) Vinc was really good.

Goalie Matt Vinc makes one of his 43 saves for the Knighthawks.

    “He made some spectacular saves tonight. We didn’t have enough. We were flat I thought at the start for some reason.”

    The Rush now head on their bye week, and they return to action on April 7, when they host the Colorado Mammoth at 7:30 p.m. at the SaskTel Centre.
    They have advanced to the last three straight NLL finals and would like to extend that run to four straight this season.

    The Rush won the 2015 NLL title in Edmonton and the 2016 NLL championship in Saskatchewan.

    They were swept in last year’s best-of-three NLL championship series 2-0 by the Georgia Swarm.
    The Rush play three of their final four regular season games at home.

Robert Church, left, scored four goals for the Rush on Saturday.

    Corbeil believes the week off will help his team, who lead the Colorado Mammoth (9-4) by one-and-a-half games for first in the Western Division.

    “I think rest always goes a long way in this league, so that will help us for sure having a weekend off,” said Corbeil. “Obviously, our schedule is pretty front loaded.

    “These losses always seem to kind of wake us back up, which is nice. I don’t think we’ve lost too many back to back with the exception of maybe last year’s finals. We always usually have a good response, so maybe it will be a kick in the butt that we need.”

Back in the Express with feature on Rush coach

Rush HC and GM Derek Keenan speaks at a rally in 2017.

    I was back in the pages of the Saskatoon Express this week with a feature story on Saskatchewan Rush head coach and general manager Derek Keenan.

    Keenan is the all-time leader in career head coaching victories in the history of the National Lacrosse League, and he is basically the circuit’s Scotty Bowman.

    The bench boss is pretty personable, and the 56-year-old showed his sense of humour when he was asked to reflect on his wins record.

    “I’m old,” said Keenan with a laugh. “I’ve been doing it a long time.”

    Keenan has the Rush leading the entire NLL at the moment with an 11-2 record. Local area fans will be pumped to know the Rush play four of their final five regular season games at home. That final stretch of games begins on Saturday when the Rush host the Rochester Knighthawks (6-7) at 7:30 p.m. at the SaskTel Centre.

    I found my one-on-one interview with Keenan to be real enjoyable, and I came away thinking the Rush were lucky to have him as their head coach and general manager.

    The story on Keenan can be found right here.

    If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com.

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