BISON NARROWLY DROP GAME ONE TO TOLEDO
By: Erik Kowinski, Bloomington Bison
Toledo, Ohio – Cooper Moore scored to tie the game 1-1 through two periods but the Bloomington Bison dropped Game One of its best-of-seven series to the Toledo Walleye 4-1 at the Huntington Center on Thursday evening.
Bloomington began its first ever playoff game with extended time in the defensive zone. With Toledo clogging the neutral zone, the Bison nearly allowed a breakaway that resulted from a stick lift and took a penalty to negate further damage from the blunder. Twenty seconds into the penalty kill, the Walleye potted a rebound to take a 1-0 lead. Soon after, Bloomington was assessed another minor penalty, but were able to draw an infraction of their own to bring up a truncated powerplay. The visitors were not successful on the man advantage, and ended the first stanza down 1-0 with just one shot on goal.
Flipping the script of the first, Bloomington earned much of the second period’s momentum. Grant Porter, Parker Lindauer and Deni Goure pressured, and the Bison began to pepper Toledo’s net. Lou-Felix Denis leveled a Walleye to fire up his team near the seven-minute mark and just over a minute later, Moore lit the lamp. Chongmin Lee earned the assist on Moore’s tally at 11:56 to knot the score and the Bison went on to outshoot Toledo 11-9 in the frame.
It did not take long in the third before Bloomington surrendered the eventual game-tying goal, as the Walleye went up 2-1 less than a minute in. Despite further attempts to even the contest once more, the deficit increased at 12:09. Shortly after the insurance goal, Moore dropped his gloves in a fight. The Bison pulled their goaltender to get an extra attacker on the ice, but gave up an empty-net goal, leading to the 4-1 final. Dryden McKay made 26 saves on 29 shots, while Bloomington managed just 16 shots on net.
Playoff packages are now on sale for Game 3, 4 and 5, which will be played at Grossinger Motors Arena on Monday, April 27, Wednesday, April 29 and Thursday, April 30.
Visit ticketmaster.com or call 309-965-HERD to purchase tickets today and guarantee the lowest price on playoff tickets.
