Roughnecks Finish With An Offensive Outburst In The Final Frame
Oakville, ON – The Toronto Rock opened up the preseason with a 14-11 loss to the Calgary Roughnecks on Saturday night at the Toronto Rock Athletic Centre in Oakville, ON.
The visiting Roughnecks came out strong in the first quarter, scoring three times in the opening frame. Calgary newcomer Austin Ducommun opened the scoring on a setup from Haiden Dickson and NLL veteran Dane Dobbie. The Rock would then score a goal of their own from Marley Angus to knot the game up at one before Calgary would net two goals just three minutes apart courtesy of Jesse King and Brett McIntyre.
After being down 3-1 at the end of the first quarter, the Rock needed to come out quicker and stronger in the second and they did just that. Josh Dawick scored 56 seconds in before Tyler Hendrycks tied the game up at three after a shot at the end of the possession squeaked in past Calgary starting goaltender, Cam MacLeod. Midway through the quarter, the intensity started to increase, and so did the number of penalties, and because of that, Calgary found themselves on a powerplay and Dobbie buried a quick-stick pass from Curtis Dickson. Angus was able to find the scoresheet again just before the half to give Toronto a 4-3 lead at the break.
In the second half, the Rock came alive. Toronto was able to score four goals in just under four minutes in the third quarter to gain some huge momentum, two of the goals came on the powerplay. The Roughnecks were able to score one late to make it an 8-7 game after three quarters of play.
In the fourth quarter, the Roughnecks were the ones who took back the momentum by scoring twice in 1:22. After taking back the lead, the Rock were able to get two goals of their own from Chris Boushy and Brian Cameron. With under seven minutes to play and the Rock up by one, Zack Kearney buried a goal in transition off a long-stretch pass from goalie Dante Mancini to give Toronto a two-goal lead. However, the Roughnecks were able to rattle off four straight goals in the final four minutes of play to secure the win.
Rookie Brian Cameron potted two goals for the Rock and credited his goals to the fans who were ecstatic all night long.
“Place was jam-packed for a preseason game, it looked like a soldout crowd to me with fans, dancers, music, live stream, so that was pretty cool,” said Cameron who as a Rock second round draft pick in the 2022 NLL Draft. “I had a lot of friends and family watching on the YouTube channel so that was cool knowing that they were watching but the atmosphere in here was incredible.”
Another contributor on the score sheet was Rock defender, and 2024 first round draft pick, Jake Darlison who experienced his first NLL preseason action.
“It was awesome. Everyone battled and that’s kind of the big thing. We played right to the end,” said Darlison. “I thought everyone played great, especially all of our rookies who got out all the nerves.”
The Toronto Rock will be back in preseason action next Saturday night at the Toronto Rock Athletic Centre at 7pm ET against the Saskatchewan Rush. If you can’t attend, you can watch the game live on the Rock’s YouTube Channel @TorontoRockLax.
For more information on Toronto Rock tickets, please contact a Toronto Rock account executive by phone at 416-596-3075, by email at tickets@torontorock.com or visit torontorock.com.
