Mike Vecchione scored off an odd-man rush 7:58 into overtime to offer the Hershey Bears a 5-4 win over the Cleveland Monsters in the opener of the Eastern Conference Finals on Thursday night.

Game 2 of the best-of-seven series is Saturday at Giant Center.

Vecchione ended up a offer-and-go with Alex Limoges to give the Bears the 1-0 series lead after they had actually given up a two-goal lead late in guideline.

Ethen Frank, scratched for Hershey’s series-clinching win over Hartford last round, went back to the lineup and scored his 6th objective of the postseason to put the Bears on the board initially 4:24 into the contest.

Cleveland responded to with 2 objectives in a period of 1:21 early in the 2nd duration, as Hunter McKown and Alex Whelan scored to put the Monsters in front.

Hershey reacted at 6:15 of the 2nd when Vecchione’s shot deflected off Aaron Ness and entered, connecting the video game at 2-2. Chase Priskie and Hendrix Lapierre added power-play objectives, and the Bears took a 4-2 lead into the subsiding minutes of guideline.

But the Monsters required overtime by scoring two times in the last 83 seconds of the 3rd duration. Trey Fix-Wolansky swept in a shot from down low with the Monsters skating on a 6-on-4 power-play benefit at 18:37, and David Jiricek circled around the offending zone before discovering space to blast a shot home with 19.1 seconds to go.

Hershey, which was 4-0 in overtime throughout their 2023 champion run, was playing its very first OT video game of this postseason. The Monsters had actually been 7-2 all-time in playoff overtime video games.

Hunter Shepard (7-1) made 21 conserves for the Bears. Jet Greaves turned aside 30 shots for Cleveland.

(Hershey leads series, 1-0)
Game 1 – Thu., May 30 – HERSHEY 5, Cleveland 4 (OT)
Game 2 – Sat., June 1 – Cleveland at Hershey, 7:00
Game 3 – Tue., June 4 – Hershey at Cleveland, 7:00
Game 4 – Thu., June 6 – Hershey at Cleveland, 7:00
*Game 5 – Sat., June 8 – Hershey at Cleveland, 7:00
*Game 6 – Mon., June 10 – Cleveland at Hershey, 7:00
*Game 7 – Wed., June 12 – Cleveland at Hershey, 7:00
*if needed… All times Eastern