Cam Morrison led the way with two goals while Cory Conacher and Santtu Kinnunen also found the back of the net for a Checkers team that went 3-for-4 on the man advantage in this game. Mack Guzda made 24 saves to earn the victory.
The win moved the Checkers up from fifth to third in the Atlantic Division with two games left to play. The third and fourth-placed teams will have home-ice advantage in the first round of the playoffs that begin next week.
After the teams traded goals to find themselves in a 2-2 deadlock with 10 minutes left in the third, the turning point occurred when Hershey forward Hendrix Lapierre, the hat-trick hero in the teams’ most recent meeting just three days ago, earned a five-minute major and a game misconduct for hitting Checkers forward Logan Hutsko from behind – an incident that left Hutsko bloodied and forced to leave the game.
After coming up empty through the first three minutes of the five-minute power play, the Checkers received a two-man advantage as Hershey’s Connor McMichael was whistled for unsportsmanlike conduct. Kinnunen made short work of that opportunity, rifling a shot home to give his team their third lead of the game, 3-2.
Morrison appeared to put the game away before the original Lapierre penalty could expire less than a minute later, taking a slap pass from McAllister and redirecting it home for an unprecedented two-goal lead, but Hershey made it interesting on a power-play goal of their own with just over three minutes remaining.
The Checkers had to make a gutsy effort to hang on as Hershey pulled its goaltender down the stretch and possessed the puck uninterrupted for the final 1:28 of regulation time in the Checkers’ zone.
Charlotte, which has played one more game than the two teams it leapfrogged in the standings tonight, will try to hold on to its home ice advantage as it finishes the regular season with games in Lehigh Valley on Friday and in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton on Saturday.
