Lavoie nets overtime winner as Henderson tops Bakersfield 3-2

Henderson’s last regular-season game at Lee’s Family Forum looked less like a farewell and more like a test of playoff nerve. Raphael Lavoie passed it, burying a power-play goal at 3:56 of overtime to give the Silver Knights a 3-2 win over Bakersfield in a game that never relaxed for a second in front of 3,046.

That finish mattered because Bakersfield did not come to Henderson just to survive the night. The Condors had already clinched a Calder Cup Playoffs berth and were still chasing seeding in a tight Pacific Division race, while Henderson was trying to keep sharpening the habits that earned it a postseason return for the first time since 2022. This was the eighth and final meeting of the season series, and Bakersfield had owned a 4-2-1 edge entering the night, so the Silver Knights were not just winning a game. They were cutting into a matchup that had leaned the other way for most of the year.

Bakersfield struck first when Viljami Marjala tipped in an Atro Leppanen shot on the power play at 3:57 of the second period, with Quinn Hutson drawing the assist. For a team sitting on 83 points, that kind of road goal can usually slow the game down and force the home side to chase. Henderson answered early in the third, though, and changed the temperature of the building almost instantly. Trevor Connelly tied it 1:18 into the final period, then Kai Uchacz put the Silver Knights in front on the power play at 8:50.

Henderson still had to survive the hardest part. Seth Griffith beat the clock with 40 seconds left in regulation, finishing with the goalie pulled and assists from Roby Järventie and Quinn Hutson to force overtime. That could have deflated a group that had already done the work to lead late. Instead, Henderson reset and cashed in when the extra period turned into a special-teams chance. Connelly and Dylan Coghlan set up Lavoie for the winner, giving Henderson its seventh straight victory and a clean final home result after clinching its own playoff berth with a 5-4 comeback over Tucson on April 4.

The Silver Knights head to Tucson for games Friday and Saturday, and this one said plenty about where they are right now. The offense can answer, the power play can land a punch, and when the game turns tense in the final minute, Henderson has started to look like a team that expects to finish.