Saskatchewan Rush eliminated on home floor by Toronto Rock in NLL quarter-final loss

A season with much promise ended on Saturday night for the Saskatchewan Rush, falling 16-13 in National Lacrosse League quarter-finals to the Toronto Rock.

The Rush rallied to close an early deficit in the first half, but the visitors from Toronto proved to be too much in the fourth quarter as they knocked off Saskatchewan in the single elimination quarter-final contest.

Rock forward Chris Boushy starred in the win for Toronto with five goals and one assist to move his team on to the NLL’s ‘Final Four.’

It’s a disappointing end to the 2025-26 campaign for the Rush, who led atop the NLL standings with a 10-1 record at one point and now will pack up their gear for the season.

Toronto’s Josh Dawick opened the scoring 2:23 into the game, which was answered a few minutes later by Rush forward Austin Shanks with a snipe from distance to tie it at 1-1.

From there, the Rock controlled the first quarter netting five of the next six goals including a hat-trick from Boushy to take a 6-2 lead over the Rush after 15 minutes of play.

Allowing six goals against on 12 shots, Rush goaltender Frank Scigliano was briefly swapped out for backup goaltender Thomas Kiazyk before Scigliano finished out the rest of the quarter.

Both Scigliano and Toronto goaltender Nick Rose came out of the break with a handful of stellar saves, keeping it a 6-2 game until Saskatchewan’s Levi Anderson let a low, screaming shot fly 7:31 into the second quarter.

Rush captain Ryan Keenan quickly made it a 6-4 game, before Toronto responded on the power play with a flukey goal banked off rookie phenom CJ Kirst to restore the Rock’s three-goal lead.

An unlikely goal scorer cut the deficit to 7-5 for Saskatchewan, as stay-at-home defender Connor McClelland sniped his first goal since the 2024 NLL season with 5:29 remaining in the opening half.

Saskatchewan continued to pour on the offence before the end of the first half with an end-to-end goal by Ryan Barnable and a power play marker from Church to tie the game at 7-7.

Toronto got the last laugh to end the second quarter courtesy of Latrell Harris, who picked off a Rush pass and netted the go-ahead goal for the Rock to lead at the half by an 8-7 count.

Sophomore forward Brock Haley needed just 17 seconds out of halftime to net his first goal of the night with some fancy stick work, setting the stage for Church to complete the hat-trick and give the Rush their first lead of the night.

Saskatchewan’s goal scoring dried up from that point on in the third quarter, as Toronto netted goals from Dawick and Boushy to re-take the lead 10-9.

Former Rush star Mark Matthews made his mark with just 3.6 seconds left in third quarter with a back-breaking snipe on Scigliano, as that goal boosted Toronto’s lead to 11-9 heading to the fourth quarter.

Zach Manns cut the deficit to 12-10 with a spectacular goal while falling to the floor early in the fourth quarter, but that was quickly erased off the rush by Toronto’s Elijah Gash to make it a three-goal game.

Toronto piled on more goals late in the fourth quarter from Boushy, Kirst and Brad Kri on an empty-net to take a 16-11 lead.

Shanks netted two goals in the final 1:06 to complete his hat-trick, however the late deficit was too large to overcome for Saskatchewan.

The Rock will now advance to face the Colorado Mammoth in NLL semi-finals, while the Halifax Thunderbirds will take on the Georgia Swarm after upsetting the top-ranked Vancouver Warriors on Friday.

More to come…