Hershey falls to Rochester in Game 5

The Hershey Bears failed to close out their 3-1 series lead to the Rochester Americans suffering a 4-1 loss at Giant Center in Hershey. It’s now 3-2 with the Bears having the advantage still with the series shifting to Rochester on Friday night.

It was sold out in Chocolatetown with 10,520 fans as the Bears not only had a chance to punch their ticket to the Calder Cup Finals for the first time since 2016, but also because the giveaway was a free day pass to Hershey Park for all fans.

Rochester struck first at 4:43 and never looked back with a writer from Jiri Kulich past the blocker of Hunter Shepard. The Bears outshot the Americans 24-17 through the first two periods.

Rochester went up 2-0 at 1:22 in the third and this time hung onto the lead. Though the Bears made it interesting with a deflection from Aliaksei Protas on the power play at 3:44 for his fifth goal of the playoffs. Logan Day had the initial shot and Joe Snively had the secondary assist.

The Americans put the pedal to the medal with a power play goal from Michael Mersch at 13:11 and an empty net goal from Rousek at 18:38.

Shots were 33-27 in favor of the Bears and Shepard went 23 for 26 in the loss. The Bears were 1 for 2 on the power play while Rochester went 1 for 4.

The series continues on Friday June 2 with Game 6 at 7:05 p.m. in Rochester. Should the series return to Giant Center, Game 7 will be Monday night.

Today the Washington Capitals introduced Spencer Carbery to the media. We’ll have more on that in a bit. You may remember him from coaching the Hershey Bears where we was behind the bench for three seasons.

He helped lay the foundation of where the Bears are today and even though the Bears failed to close out the series last night I am confident they can finish it on Friday.