TORONTO – The Toronto Rock host the Buffalo Bandits on Friday, February 20th in the second part of a home-and-home series that got underway last Saturday. Game time is set for 7:00 p.m. at the Air Canada Centre.
The Rock (2-4) are recovering from a 25-10 road loss to the Bandits on February 14th at HSBC Arena.
“We’ve studied the tape, found the problems and we’ll work in practice to fix them,” said Toronto Rock head coach, Jamie Batley. “We have to improve our backend, and our offence will need to score more than 10 goals to beat Buffalo this week.”
“Our locker room is full of character players, and they were not happy with last weekend’s outcome. They will all rise to the occasion and play their hardest.”
Blaine Manning and Luke Wiles led the charge for Toronto scoring three goals apiece. Chris Driscoll, Kasey Beirnes, Craig Conn, and Mark Scherman each chipped in one goal for the Rock.
Jason Crosbie leads Toronto in points for the sixth consecutive week. Crosbie added another five assists last weekend to bring his points total to 31 (9 goals, 22 assists).
With the win over Toronto, the Buffalo Bandits improve their record to 6-1 on the season. Top goal scorers for the Bandits were Roger Vyse with six and John Tavares with four. Forward Mark Steenhuis recorded 17 points (4 goals, 13 assists).
Bandits head coach Darris Kilgour knows the 25-10 blowout is not something that will make Toronto roll over this week, and warns his team not to take the Rock too lightly.
“This is not going to sit well (with Toronto),” said Kilgour after Saturday’s game. “They have a week to think about it so I’m expecting a pretty rough game and a lot of intensity.”
Toronto Rock will be revealing their 2009 third jersey Friday in this years’ Annual Charity Game. Fans will have the chance to bid in a silent auction on the third jerseys worn during the game by the team. Funds raised in the silent auction will support the Cash for Cancer Lottery benefitting the R.S McLaughlin Durham Regional Cancer Centre as well as Special Olympics Ontario.
Highest bidders of the special game worn third jerseys in the silent auction will be welcomed onto the floor after the game on Friday night to meet the players and take their jersey right of the players’ back. The silent auction begins inside Gate One when the doors open at 6:00 p.m. and ends at the beginning of the third quarter.
In addition, for every game ticket sold for this game, the Toronto Rock is pleased to announce that Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment will donate $1 to the selected charities on behalf of the Toronto Rock.
February 20th is also Hawaiian Night and the first 5,000 fans will receive a Hawaiian lei and a pair of Cash for Cancer thundersticks.
Never miss a shot, even if you can’t make the game! The Toronto Rock website has a direct link to the NLL Network featuring high quality online video broadcasts of the NLL regular season and playoff games for the 2009 season. Watch every ball drop live or on demand in your free time.
Catch all Toronto Rock games free of charge on the ROCK TV portion of the website. Visit http://www.torontorock.com <http://www.torontorock.com> and click on ‘ROCK TV’ under the multimedia heading.