Buffalo Bandits 5 – San Diego Seals 4

Perhaps the exchanged shots off the post and others being blocked were a sign of things to come. Probably not, but just maybe they were. Or maybe it was how the opening goal of the game was scored, a broken play out of the first tv timeout that saw Dhane Smith lose possession from a double team only for Ian MacKay to get to the loose ball and take a route to the net to sneak the ball past the shoulders of Chris Origlieri. Aside from a laser shot from Josh Byrne that dented the crossbar with less than six minutes to go in the quarter, shot after shot was turned away, 16 of them from Matt Vinc to set the tone, highlighted in the final minute with a midrange save and then an immediate Hasek-esque sliding save on Wes Berg in front on the rebound. Origlieri had 10 on the other side.

Despite the Bandits holding extended possession time to open the second quarter, a shot clock violation forced by the Seals defense led to Zach Currier getting his team on the board for the first time in the game. After San Diego won the ensuing faceoff, and Wes Berg scored amidst a crowd of orange to take the lead. Buffalo would get it back, however, as a Dhane Smith look in front was initially stopped by Chris Origlieri but rebounded by Kyle Buchanan, who would play a pair of two man games with Smith in isolation to eventually give Smith the room to fire a hard shot short side to even the game at 2. While the Seals controlled the next five or so minutes, a fury of shots near the net were all turned away by Matt Vinc. The Bandits offense was held in check during that stretch, but then a multi-shot possession for the Bandits extended for nearly a minute and ended with Ian MacKay wrapping around his man in front of the net to grab a rebound and quickly finding space to put it back and give the Bandits their lead back. The game flow had shifted back into the favor of Buffalo, and after Berg was denied on a rebound, Vinc would send an outlet pass to Nick Weiss, who snatched angles on a stop and go move to get to the net for a breakaway goal with 1:13 left in the half. The Bandits would eventually get the final possession of the half, and with an overload on the left side, a screen from Chase Fraser opened up ample space for Smith to receive a pass from Byrne, draw the crease-side defender, and leave Buchanan wide open behind the net to finish off a dunk at the horn, giving the Bandits a 5-2 lead.

A new entry into the game made itself known early on in the third quarter: the whistle. About 2 minutes in, San Diego was called for the first penalty of the game. However, both Bandit shots on the first powerplay of the game were cleanly turned aside. An illegal body check on a screen led to Buffalo going down a man for the first time about a minute after the expiration of the first powerplay, and after Cam Wyers and Paul Dawson broke up a slot pass on the first possession, the Bandits forwards got a little too eager and were called for an illegal substitution, giving the Seals the chance for a near full 5-on-3. But only a chance. as after Zach Currier was stopped on a post-to-post save from Matt Vinc, he was called on the other end for a cross-check of Steve Priolo who was attempting to tiptoe on the crease for a near goal that was waved off for his foot being in the crease. The Seals failed to get a shot on goal during the 4-on-3, but soon after the game returned to 5-on-5, they did finally break the scoring in the second half, as Tre LeClaire drove to the net fresh off the bench and put the only of 11 shots on goal against Vinc in the frame past him with 5 minutes left.

Late in the quarter, coincidental minors sent the game to 4-on-4, but once again, neither team had a marquee scoring chance. After Dhane Smith and Josh Currier got to the net only to be stopped, Buffalo went back to the kill after Zack Belter was called for continuing to play after losing his helmet, and while Wes Berg did beat Matt Vinc, it was immediately waved off since the rebound that allowed Berg to get the ball initially hit off his left glove. Two saves later, the penalty was killed off. As the game entered its second last TV timeout, it was no longer “are both teams being goalied?”, it was now “is a record going to be broken tonight?” Berg continued to try and will his team to another goal, but shot after shot, Vinc was there. And while Buffalo was also getting all of their shots turned away, they would take a minute and a half off the clock to the tune of offensive rebounds from Kyle Buchanan, Clay Scanlan, and Tehoka Nanticoke to set the clock to 6:30 to play, and maybe it was the fatigue of the extra possession, but after Graydon Bradley outlet pass was deflected by Nanticoke, the defender cross-checked the forward to the group and went to the box. San Diego’s penalty kill blocked a shot and forced two others to go wide, and the clock approached four minutes to play. The Seals got their first net pull with about 1:30 to play, with their shot opportunity going wide, but after Dylan Robinson’s empty net heave went over the net, he took out Zack Deaken with a major penalty and 58.3 on the clock.

The Seals would get the rest of the game on a powerplay or would tie the game. Zach Currier found Ben McIntosh in the middle of the box in front of the net, but the quick stick went wide. The shot following the rebound from Wes Berg went wide, and then an outside shot from Ryan Benesch was stopped by Matt Vinc. McIntosh rebounded, but Vinc turned that one aside as well. Rob Hellyer rebounded and found Wes Berg, but his shot was blocked by Paul Dawson. Steve Priolo would rebound and immediately call timeout with the clock showing 26.2. Out of the timeout, Vinc sent a full floor pass that was batted down by Trent DiCicco, killing another 10 seconds before he re-entered the zone and found Berg, who was once again stopped by Vinc. The ball went right to Dhane Smith, who cleared the ball faster that it could even find a home in the head of his stick. Chris Origlieri chased the ball down and sent it back to the offensive zone, Rob Hellyer found Zach Currier on the doorstep, and he beat Vinc over the shoulder. The Seals were back within 1.

But after looking up at the clock, it also read 1. The ensuing clamp lasted the entire final second of the game. The horn sounded, and the Buffalo Bandits had a quarterfinal win in the lowest scoring game in NLL history.

Before this calendar year, no team had ever won a game while scoring less than 7 goals. This includes the previous lowest scoring game ever, which was a 7-4 win for the Toronto Rock over the Albany Attack on January 11, 2001. Then on January 5 of this year, the Seals beat that record with a 6-5 win over Ottawa.

There have now been 106 games in which a team was limited to 5 or less goals. The Buffalo Bandits were the first of those teams to win their game, while being the 49th ever and 4th this season to hold their opponent to 4 goals.

History is written by the winner, and once again, that winner is Matt Vinc. For the third consecutive playoff run, his age 40, 41, and 42 seasons, he has held his opponent to four goals. 48 saves on 52 shots on goal faced, good for a .923. Enough to hold off the 39 saves on 44 shots faced from his opponent, Chris Origlieri, which was still good enough for an .886 for the Seals franchise goalie who is 20 years younger than Vinc.

Buffalo wins their opening round playoff game for the 6th straight playoff appearance, not having been eliminated in the first round (when clinching) since Rochester eliminated them in the Eastern Semifinal in 2015. They have now won 11 of their last 12 playoff games and 7 in a row.

And if fans thing that they may see some less defensive lacrosse in the semifinals, especially with their semis opponent not being the Toronto Rock, but the challenge ahead may be even tougher.

Vancouver Warriors 15 – Rochester Knighthawks 10

The Warriors got their first playoff goal at Rogers Arena out of the way early, as Marcus Klarich slipped a screen and finished off a pass from Adam Charalambides 2:08 into the game. Rochester would get the goal right back, however, as Thomas McConvey powered his way to the net with a crease dive to tie the game on the next possession. The defenses showed their activity from there, creating a long stretch of consecutive turnovers on both ends of the floor before Keegan Bal drove past his man, created a screen from the helpside defender, and gave Vancouver the lead back. After forcing a shot clock violation to enter the first TV timeout of the game, the play that is going to haunt Rochester the longest into the summer took place. The contact created from a Dylan McIntosh screen on Chad Tutton forced Tutton into Bal, who lost his helmet on the side boards. Seven steps later, Bal found McIntosh on the crease for the goal, leaving the Rochester bench dumbfounded that Bal was not called for a penalty for continuing to play while not having a helmet, as the rule in regards to the scenario does state, and is usually called, that the player must pass, shoot, or release the ball immediately after the helmet is dislodged. Regardless of the rule, playing to the whistle, or whatever else in between, the game had to continue on, and at this point, Vancouver now had more goals than the Knighthawks had shots on goal through the first eighth of the game. The Knighthawks drew a holding the stick penalty to get the first powerplay of the game and a chance for some shots to find their way on net. The extra space opened up the first marquee scoring chance of the game, with Ryan Smith finding Ryan Lanchbury on his opposite side for a quick stick, but Christian Del Bianco got across for a highlight denial. The possession extended for four total shots, including another big save from Del Bianco on McConvey in the slot, but everything stayed out and the penalty expired.

With the game back at full strength, an illegal screen call on Rochester sent the Warriors in transition, where in the spirit of getting goals wherever you can find them in the playoffs, Ryan Dilks scored his first goal since March 23, 2024 to extend the lead to 4-1, which the Warriors would take into the intermission. Wrapped around with a Matt Gilray breakaway being saved and Ryan Smith being robbed unconstested in front, followed by goals in quick succession from a picking and popping Kevin Crowley and Riley Loewen being left unmarked open in front, sending Rylan Hartley to the bench, a sense of “here we go again” was starting to become too strong to ignore for Rochester. While they did kill a penalty taken off the next faceoff and then came out of the under 10 with a goal from Ryan Smith with Hartley back between the pipes, a powerplay of their own resulted in more of the same. After Connor Fields scored on a turnaround shot to make it 6-3 with just over 5 minutes left in the half, the Warriors had one more turbo run in them to close the quarter out, starting with Crowley creating space for himself to get open in front and finish off a look from Keegan Bal, who would score from outside on their next possession as the clock fell to two minutes. A broken up two man game by Owen Grant and Jeff Cornwall led to Grant feeding Cornwall on the break, and he scored in transition to push the Warriors lead to 9-3 at the half.

An outside goal from Kyle Waters and a drawn penalty gave a glimmer of hope to open up the second half for the Knighthawks, but some bread and butter from Christian Del Bianco, who sent a three-quarters-floor outlet pass to Owen Grant to spark a 2-on-1 that Grant finished off, reminded Rochester very quickly who was in change of the game to this point. The netminder had his highest save total quarter of the game with 14, and after Keegan Bal scored in the middle of the quarter to send Riley Hutchcraft back into the game, goaltending continued to make itself a focal point of the game script. Connor Fields would get his second goal of the game to make it 11-5 after 3. The goal may have served as a catalyst towards a run in the fourth quarter, as Thomas McConvey snuck his second goal of the game past Del Bianco on a contested dive 1:33 into the final frame, and then after a faceoff win after a long clamp from Mike Sisselberger, Brad Gillies scored on a 3-on-2 look 21 seconds later. With the game at 4-on-4 with another delayed penalty giving the Knighthawks a fifth man on a goalie pull, Ryan Smith scored from the point to cut the deficit to 3 with 9:38 still to play.

But Saturday Night in Vancouver was Keegan Bal’s night as well as Christian Del Bianco’s, as the forward halted the comeback run with his fourth goal of the game with 7:50 to play, while another goal from Ryan Smith on Rocheter’s next possession helped them keep pace, Ryan Martel got his first goal of the game two possessions later to make it 13-9 with 5:25 left. Rochester began their 6-on-5 capades out of the under 5 timeout, and while they were able to get a goal from outside from Thomas McConvey with 2:38 left, two empty net goals from Bal and Reid Bowering added the icing on the game and finished out quarterfinal weekend.

The win is the first for the Warriors franchise since May 4, 2013, their last season as the Washington Stealth. The win came in the Western Final over the Calgary Roughnecks before they would go on to lose to the Knighthawks in the 2013 finals, the second year of the three-peat. Their last home playoff win was the week before, a 12-11 win over the Edmonton Rush on April 27, 2013, nearly 8 years to the date.

Keegan Bal had played 111 NLL games before making his playoff debut, which was the most in the league before Saturday, and he made it count with 5 goals and 6 assists for his third double-digit point output in the last six games. Adam Charalambides had 5 assists, while Kevin Crowley had 2 goals and 2 assists. Ten total Warriors scored a goal and 12 total picked up points, including Christian Del Bianco with 2 assists. He also was credited with 6 loose balls on top of his strongest impact on the game with 48 saves, keeping the .820 save percentage pace he’s carried in the 7 game winning streak that aligns with his arrival at the trade deadline. The save total matches the playoff high he set in game 1 of the 2019 NLL finals, where he defeated the team he’s playing next week in the venue he’s playing in next week.

After Rochester’s regular season finale, Mike Hasen talked about how it served as a reminder about starting on time, a lesson that, while they did that well for most of the regular season, also plagued them in their two previous first round exits. Saturday served almost as a snooze button on time, as the Warriors run took place in the later half of the opening quarter, but a -3 first and second quarter once again had them behind early and widely enough that improved play in the second half could not make up the difference. Ryan Lanchbury had 7 assists to lead the team in points, while Connor Fields had 2 goals and 4 assists and each of Ryan Smith and Thomas McConvey had 3 goals. The Warriors limited Rochester’s transition players to only a single goal and assist and the secondary offensive options to a goal and 2 assists. Rylan Hartley was limited to 20 saves on 31 shots faced in 36:51. Riley Hutchcraft stopped 12 of the 14 shots that he faced. Hartley has been pulled for parts of all three of his postseason appearances.

Halifax Thunderbirds 16 – Calgary Roughnecks 12

In talking about starting on time, Halifax did just that in the first playoff home game in the Maritimes. The Thunderbirds led 3-0 after the first and had answers, sometimes multiple, for each of Calgary’s responses on the way to leading by as much as 6 and never by less than 2. Throughout the season, the Thunderbirds transition game put their offensive output over the top, and Trevor Smyth’s first career multi-goal game helped that out, but it was one of the most complete games of the season for their forward group, totally opposite from the stunning shutdown they suffered in last year’s one-and-done playoff game in Albany.

Thomas Hoggarth’s 3 goals and 5 assists led Halifax’s offense, the 5 assists matching a career high that he first set with the Bandits back on March 16, 2019. Randy Staats added 2 goals and 5 assists, with Clarke Petterson and Mike Robinson each having a goal and 5 assists. Cody Jamieson’s 7th career playoff hat trick and Dawson Theede’s first rounded out the scoring. Drew Hutchison won his first career playoff start with 39 saves.

For a veteran-heavy Calgary team that could look quite different again next season, Curtis Dickson had 3 goals and 5 assists, while Dane Dobbie had a goal and 5 assists, Jesse King had 2 goals and 3 assists, and Tyler Pace had 4 goals and an assist. Nick Rose made 42 saves despite the loss.

Saskatchewan Rush 13 – Georgia Swarm 9

The Swarm scored the first two goals of the night, but after the Rush rattled off the next four, they did not relinquish the lead the rest of the way. Saskatchewan outshot Georgia 83-63, 60-48 on goal, and used that advantage to advance in the playoffs for the first time since their 2018 championship run.

The transition game of the Rush, which has complimented their stout defensive play throughout the season very well, was led by a 4 goal performance from Jake Boudreau, who also added an assist, 9 loose balls, and forced 3 turnovers. Ryan Keenan and Austin Shanks each had 2 goals and 2 assists, while Matt Hossack and Robert Church each had 3 assists. Frank Scigliano finished with 39 saves in his 4th career playoff win.

For the Swarm, Jordan MacIntosh had 2 goals and 2 assists, while Lyle Thompson had a goal and 3 assists to lead the way. Bryan Cole and Brendan Bomberry each had 2 goals and an assist. Brett Dobson took the loss despite 47 saves.

Previewing the Semifinals

In each of the two seasons of the unified standings, the top four seeds have won their quarterfinal matchups. Last year, the 3 and 4 seeds advanced, Of course this year, that 4-seed is now the 1-seed.

The post-COVID Bandits-Warriors matchups have each been 13-12 Warriors wins, once in Vancouver and back on March 29 in Buffalo (Recap here). For the game itself, Buffalo’s takeaway from the loss would definitely be that two major penalties resulted in three goals against, so discipline would be the first key for them. The first half of their game with the Seals was pretty clean on both sides even with the officiating crews around the league seeming to have been more lenient on calls in all four games last weekend.

The script for both offenses looked in tune with the results of the rest of the season, with Keegan Bal doing a lot of the heavy lifting for the right side, while Adam Charalambides was active distributing across the floor, with the two of them combining for 12 assists. Dhane and Josh led the way for Buffalo, with Ian MacKay and Kyle Buchanan providing the bulk of the secondary scoring. Defensively, the Bandits and Warriors each have a good balance of size and athleticism with the ability to get out and run, so with the similarity in styles, it opens up plenty of scenarios for the series, which of course bring it back to goaltending being its own spotlight, and two of the best ever (It’s crazy that Christian Del Bainco has already played almost 7,000 minutes in the league at only 27) as the anchors.

If Buffalo does draw most of their attention to stopping Keegan Bal, it wouldn’t be a sure advantage driver if the rest of the Warriors offense can chip in once he doesn’t have possession. Regardless of who has the majority of the touches for Vancouver, continuing to get in front of shot lanes at the frequency that the Bandits do will have the chance to be an equalizer.

Of course, the rest of the variables at play in the series are in the form of the crowds and the impacts of the travel in games 1-2, having to go cross-country between Friday and Sunday. All of this combined makes this a really intriguing series to see who makes the NLL Finals.

On the other side of the bracket, there is a bit of a clash of styles at play, as the Thunderbirds have relied most consistently on their offense this season while the Rush’s defense is their foundation. Both teams run really well and are pretty good in special teams, but the biggest difference between the two teams in that department is that Saskatchewan on the season has taken the least amount of penalties in the league compared to Halifax who is consistently finding themselves towards the top of that leaderboard. The goaltending is once again an X-factor in this matchup. Can Frank Scigliano continue to prove that the late season workload concerns that have been attached to his career aren’t a factor this year? Will Drew Hutchison be able to play like a playoff starter once again this week?

With the scheduling quirks that come with a three game series in the NLL, will Halifax getting their home game of the three in Game 1 tilt the series? Lots of questions to be answered in a rematch of the 2012 and 2018 finals.

(Photo Credit for both Photos: Buffalo Bandits)