The quest for a third championship in four years starts for the Saskatchewan Rush on May 26 when they host the Rochester Knighthawks in Game 1 of the best-of-three National Lacrosse League (NLL) final.
The Rush had the best record in the league this season (14-4) but two of their four losses came at the hands of the Knighthawks (10-8), making it difficult to determine which team is the favourite and which one is the underdog.
Saskatchewan scored more goals (254) than any other team in the league during the regular season but Rochester wasn’t far behind at 236.
Defensively it’s also a fairly even matchup with the Rush allowing a league-low 196 goals against while the Knighthawks allowed 210.
The Rush boast the top two scorers in the league in Mark Matthews (116 points) and Robert Church (107), but the Knighthawks are led by Joe Resetarits and Cody Jamieson, who combined for 189 points on the year. Resetarits set a new NLL record for points by an American-born player with an even 100.
In goal, the Knighthawks appear to have the edge.
Matt Vinc enters the championship series on the heels of a standout performance in the East Division Final, allowing only eight goals on 54 shots for a save percentage of 0.852.
Rush goaltender Evan Kirk, on the other hand, struggled in Saskatchewan’s West Division Final win over the Calgary Roughnecks, posting a pedestrian 0.717 save percentage after giving up 13 goals on 46 shots.
The teams have met in the finals once before, in 2012, when the Knighthawks beat the then-Edmonton Rush 9-6 in a one-game, winner-take-all championship.
The victory was the first of three straight NLL titles for Rochester. The Rush won the next two before losing last year’s championship to the Georgia Swarm.
Comments