Palat, Ondrej

We continue our Prospect of the Week award, an honor (virtually) given to one Tampa Bay Lightning prospect for their recent contributions on and off the ice.

The Prospect of the Week for March 4 is … Ondrej Palat, W, Syracuse (AHL – USA).

Ondrej Palat liked being Prospect of the Week so much he did it again.

The Syracuse Crunch winger had his first career hat trick this past week, scoring three goals on Tuesday against Rochester. He was named first star for the Crunch in their 4-1 win. After a scoreless game against Albany on Friday, Palat had a power play goal in Syracuse’s overtime loss on Saturday.

Late game meltdown.

SYR-3
HER-5

Cedrick Desjardins allowed 5 goals on just 19 shots. Ouch.

First Period
HER DiSalvatore, (15) (Taffe, Almeida), 6:53
SYR Wilson, (5) (Jacques, Namestnikov), 8:47
SYR Johnson, (29) (Panik, Barberio), 19:25

Second Period
SYR Oberg, (1) (Panik, Taormina), 1:43
HER Taffe, (14) (Oleksy, Carman), 10:42
HER Taffe, (15) (Carman, Schilling), 16:33

Third Period
HER Schilling, (6) (Taffe, DiSalvatore), 11:16
HER Wellman, (11) (Oleksy, McNeill), 14:47

Ondrej Palat did not dress for the Crunch, fueling speculation he may be on his way up to the show.

Syracuse outshot Hershey 33-19, but still got belted on the scoreboard. Rotton bad weekend for Syracuse. They face Toronto on Wednesday.

Box score from TheAHL.com.

All of a sudden, Syracuse is struggling to win close games too.

ROC-2
SYR-1 (OT)

Riku Helenius allowed 2 goals on 26 shots for the overtime loss.

First Period
RCH Mancari, (17) (McCormick, Rissmiller), 10:25 (PP)

Second Period
NO SCORING

Third Period
SYR Palat, (11) (Barberio, Gudas), 1:28 (PP)

Overtime
RCH McNabb, (5) (Mancari, Adam), 4:50 (PP)

Ondrej Palat was the game's second star. Palat has 5 goals and 13 points in his last 8 games. I believe that technically qualifies as "on fire". With Benoit Pouliot possibly hurt in today's game against Boston, I wonder if Palat might be worthy of some consideration for a cup of coffee.

Syracuse finishes their weekend tomorrow against Hershey.

Box score from TheAHL.com.

Palat x3!

SYR-4
ROC-1

Cedrick Desjardins allowed 1 goal on 27 shots for the win. He came within 1:35 of his third straight shutout when Bolt Prospects Alumni Nick Tarnasky stuck the shiv in his former organization's farm team.

First Period
SYR Palat, (8) (Johnson, Korobov), 10:17
SYR Palat, (9) (Connolly, Oberg), 14:20 (PP)

Second Period
NO SCORING

Third Period
SYR Palat, (10) (Wyman, Johnson), 15:35
RCH Tarnasky, (12) (Rissmiller, Ellis), 18:25 (PP)
SYR Wilson, (4) (Brown, Mikkelson), 18:53 (EN)

Ondrej Palat, Desjardins, and Tyler Johnson were the game's three stars. Palat's hat trick moved him into the top-20 in the AHL in scoring, tied with 2 others for 16th at 43 points. Johnson's 53 points are now tops in the league and Brett Connolly is tied for 4th at 49 points.

The scoring is nice, and it makes everyone feel good, but the defense and goaltending is what really should scare every other team in the AHL. Syracuse has run their winning streak out to 8 games now, and when this organization went on the tear it did last year in Norfolk, it was just as much about stifling defense and solid goaltending as it was about glitzy scoring. Syracuse's 190 goals lead the AHL pretty comfortably, but the big thing to watch now is whether they can start to catch up to teams like Bingo and Springfield in goals against. History tells us that when Coach Cooper has it all in place, his teams are extremely stingy.

Syracuse draws Albany on Friday as they go for #9.

Box score from TheAHL.com.

We continue our Prospect of the Week award, an honor (virtually) given to one Tampa Bay Lightning prospect for their recent contributions on and off the ice.

The Prospect of the Week for February 25 is … Ondrej Palat, W, Syracuse (AHL – USA)

Ondrej Palat doesn’t make headlines.

The Syracuse Crunch forward is a complimentary winger, usually photographed in the background of a dramatic goal or its celebration. But without him, that play probably doesn’t happen.

Palat gives a scoring line 2-way ability or playmaking, whichever is needed the most. Like Martin St. Louis with the Lightning, if a coach adds him to a line, that line gets better.