SEA DOGS – SAGUENEENS GAME AT A GLANCE
Final Score (OT): Chicoutimi 4, Saint John 3
Saint John Goals: Mike Thomas (3), Nathan Beaulieu (3), and Jonathan Huberdeau (14)
Chicoutimi Goals: Eric Gelinas (3), Steve Lebel (4), and Billy Lacasse (6)
Winning Goaltender: Robin Gusse
Losing Goaltender: Frederic Piche
THE NUMBERS
Power Play: Sagueneens: 1/4, Sea Dogs: 0/3
Shots on Goal: Sagueneens: 7+16+9+1+1=34, Sea Dogs: 15+7+14+3+0=39
Length: 2:30
Attendance: 4,595
SAINT JOHN SCRATCHES
Simon Despres missed his second straight game with a hip injury. The Pittsburgh Penguins prospect missed Friday’s game versus Cape Breton as well. He is questionable for Game One of the Subway Super Series tomorrow at Harbour Station. Rookies Tyrone Sock and Guillaume Cloutier were both in the lineup as defensemen.
Scott Oke was the scratched forward for Saint John
A poorly played game by the Saint John Sea Dogs was enough to steal a point from of a 4-3 shootout loss to the Chicoutimi Sagueneens in Quebec Major Junior Hockey League action last night at Harbour Station.
The Sea Dogs allowed the Sagueneens to carry the play for most of the game. Saint John played a style of game that is becoming typical of them against a lower level opponent. The Dogs got off to a decent start in the first period but slowly let their momentum evaporate, eventually being forced to climb back from a two goal deficit.
The Sea Dogs were fortunate to even salvage a point out of the game as two goals in final minute forced to match into overtime and the eventual shootout.
The Sagueneens opened the scoring at 14:04 of the first with Zach Phillips in the box. New Jersey Devils prospect Eric Gelinas blasted a rolling puck through traffic from inside the line and beat Frederic Piche to make it 1-0.
In the second period, the Sea Dogs dug themselves into a hole by getting down by two. A shot from the corner hit the Saint John crease and was pushed in by Steve Lebel in front to give the visitors a 2-0 lead.
It wasn’t until 7:01 of the third period when Saint John was finally able to break Robin Gusse’s goose egg (by law, this phrase has to be used once per post when discussing the Sagueneens) via a Mike Thomas wraparound goal. But the Sags scored quite possibly the most deflating goal of all-time when Billy Lacasse tipped the puck up and over Piche 29 seconds later to give his team a two goal lead once again.
With under a minute left and Piche on the bench in favour of the extra attacker, Zach Phillips sent an unreal pass from the corner to a streaking Nathan Beaulieu who one-timed it past Gusse to make it a one goal game with 50 seconds left.
With under 20 seconds to go, the puck got stuck in a pile in the corner and it looked like it would stay there until the buzzer went. But Phillips was able to gain control and feed Jonathan Huberdeau at the side of the net. With under five seconds on the clock, Huberdeau beat Gusse from a sharp angle to force overtime.
Overtime solved nothing so the match went to a shootout.
Gelinas went first and scored. With YouTube on standby, Tomas Jurco shot first for Saint John but missed the net. Lebel scored for the Sags to give them a 2-0 lead before Huberdeau pulled off his trademark move to make it 2-1. Piche then stopped Charles Hudon with a great pad save, putting the pressure on Michael Kirkpatrick who would have to score to keep the shootout going.
He wouldn’t, and Chicoutimi picked up the extra point.
PRE-GAME STUFF
There was a solid pre-game ceremony prior to the game on “Support Our Troops Day” at Harbour Station. As there is every year in just about every Canadian Hockey League arena, there was a ceremony at center ice featuring some veterans and military folks.
A pleasant surprise saw Canadian born singer Terry Kelly perform during the ceremony. He’s a pretty interesting guy if you’ve never heard of him before. He performed his well known song “A Pittance of Time” as well as the Canadian anthem.
There were lots of military personnel in the stands as well.
NOT SO PERFECT
The Sea Dogs dropped their first home game of the season with a loss yesterday. They’re winning run ended at nine straight wins on Harbour Station ice. However, they still have not lost a game in regulation at home.
Speaking of Harbour Station, the Sea Dogs posted this on their Twitter page earlier today:
Thanks fans! After ten 2010-11 home games Saint John is averaging 3,978 spectators per game, an increase of 13.5% over this time last season.That is a pretty significant increase – especially for the first quarter of the season. Traditionally, crowds don’t see much of an increase until later on in the winter.
EVERYTHING MUST END
A bunch of streaks and odd facts came to an end with last night’s loss:
- First home loss of the season; nine game home winning streak ends.
- First Sea Dogs loss to Chicoutimi since the 2006-07 season.
- The Sea Dogs’ six game winning streak came to an end.
- It was the first loss with Pepsi in the building as well as the first defeat with the HD video on.
- First loss in the month of November since 2008.
Sags goaltender Robin Gusse played a solid game, stopping 36-of-39 shots. He looked a bit excited in the first period and produced some big rebounds but slowly calmed down.
“Gusse has been calm but explosive...very controlled crease management,” tweeted Moe from @TEAMshutout, a goalie school in Toronto.
Gusse picked up his first win of the season last night en route to being named the Buzzing The Net third star of the night.
TOO BAD SO SAD
The one thing we love about games like these – watching all the morons leave with two minutes left in the game. We’ll never, ever understand why people do this. It’s the same in every city and every sport across the world. Heaven forbid you wait five minutes longer on the parking lot.
One of the best blogs in hockey, The Pensblog, sums it up beautifully.
To this fan, anything that takes place on the ice is secondary to how long it will take to leave the arena parking lot. Once the clock starts to tick down, the real game begins and this game is all about getting the hell of out the building as soon as possible.CLUTCH GOALS
For some reason this fan is at a hockey game, but desperately wants to leave it.
After all, we all know that nothing important ever happens after the 18 minute mark of the third period. The final two minutes of a hockey game is never, ever exciting.
These fans typically blend in quite well.
Until the final few minutes of the game, they seem just like any other fan. However, if you wait too long to look for them, they'll be gone.
The clock hitting 0:00 is like Kryptonite to them. They have to get away before this terrible event happens.
From NHLDraftVideo.com, here is Jonathan Huberdeau’s game tying goal scored in the dying seconds of the third period. Great call by Roszell.
Here is Nathan Beaulieu’s third period goal that was scored 45 seconds prior. What a pass by Phillips.
HIGHLIGHTS
QUICK HITS
Goaltender Jacob DeSerres, who hurt his groin on Friday and had to leave the game, took part in some of warm-up and sat on the bench for the game as backup. He was definitely being a bit cautious on the ice… DeSerres also sported a new mask. He had been wearing his Brandon Wheat King helmet since he arrived… there was no inflatable Sea Dog or intro video due to the pre-game festivities… Sea Dogs head coach Gerard Gallant was not happy over Chicoutimi’s third goal as it looked like it may have been knocked down by a high stick at the blue line. The call would stand… Zach Phillips set up both late third period goals… Rogers Sportsnet junior hockey analyst Sam Cosentino was at the game and was interviewed during the second intermission on News 88.9… the Sags finish up their Maritime road trip this afternoon in Bathurst... to relive the game, check out the SN Live Blog Replay.
NEXT GAME
The Sea Dogs have a week off before facing the Acadie-Bathurst Titan next Saturday at 7:00 pm at Harbour Station.
TOMORROW
Game One of the Subway Super Series goes down tomorrow evening at Harbour Station at 7:00 pm. There are still a limited amount of tickets available. Paul L. pointed this out earlier today on the Harbour Station website:
No wonder it hasn’t sold-out yet. It has since been corrected.
The game can also be viewed on Rogers Sportsnet East, West, and Pacific beginning at 7pm and Sportsnet Ontario at 8pm. RDS will also have the game.
Photo Credits: Google, Saint John Sea Dogs, Marc Henwood, Harbour Station
No comments:
Post a Comment