NECHL Niagara overcomes a UB lead to take the Championship

Two years ago the Buffalo Bulls and the Niagara Purple Eagles ACHA teams met in the NECHL championship game. Niagara jumped all over UB but Buffalo put on a late comeback and took the game. Today Niagara got even.

Buffalo's Chris Marsack opened up the scoring 3:51 into the first period but the Purple Eagles came back on a redirect six minutes later. Tyler Stark appealed to the official that he was interfered with but the linesman would not change his ruling.

Buffalo got two more goals in the first: Marsack scored a few minutes after the Niagara goal, and Brenden Robinson put a rebound home at 18:01 to send UB into the break with a 3-1 lead.

It took less than two minutes for the NU to bring the deficit back down to one.

The Bulls still had enough to respond thanks to Willie Sanchez, who scored a power play goal 8 minutes in the second. Once again UB's two goal lead was short lived as Niagara answered right back to 9:36 into the period.

Halfway the second the Bulls were dealt a major blow when defenseman Sean Dungan had to leave the game with an injury. From that point on, even leading 4-3, the Bulls were on their heels.

Niagara scored two goal in the third period, one at the 4 minute mark and the go ahead goal half way through the period.

In the last few minutes UB found some offense but were unable to score despite coming agonizingly close several times. When the horn sounded NU took the NECHL title with a 5-4 win over the Bulls.

In two weeks the Bulls will head to ACHA Nationals where they are the #17 seed. Niagara will also be there as the #16 seed.