POSTSCRIPT: Sea Dogs 5, Foreurs 7

A collection of recaps from last night’s 7-5 Saint John Sea Dogs loss to the Val-d’Or Foreurs…

Our recap. Saint John continued their visit to Quebec on Thursday evening as they travelled to Val-d’Or to take on the Foreurs.

The Telegraph-Journal’s recap (paywall). The Saint John Sea Dogs had their four-game winning streak snapped when they dropped a 7-5 decision to the Val d’Or Foreurs on Thursday in Quebec Major Junior Hockey League action.

L’Echo Abitibien’s recap. Lots of goals were scored at the Air Creebec Centre last night.

Abitibi Express’ recap. Smallest crowd of the season in Val-d’Or last night.

News 88.9’s recap. Featuring Tim Roszell’s goal calls.

The Canadian Press’ recap. Anthony Mantha scored twice as the Val-d'Or Foreurs held off the Saint John Sea Dogs 7-5 in the lone Quebec Major Junior Hockey League game Thursday night.

SaintJohnSeaDogs.com’s recap. In the lone game on the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League Schedule Thursday night, the Saint John Sea Dogs fell to the Val d’Or Foreurs 7-5 at Centre Air Ceebec.

SCRATCHES: The Sea Dogs were without Mackenzie Brown (knee), Benjamin Hade (upper body), Michael Mastrangelo (suspension/upper body), Jurij Repe (upper body), Jason Seed (healthy), Devon Oliver-Dares (personal reasons) and Aidan Kelly (upper body) on Thursday night.

FIRST PERIOD: Val-d’Or took a 2-1 lead into the first intermission. They opened the scoring and closed the scoring in the period, outshooting Saint John 10-7 in the process. Stephen MacAulay had Saint John’s only goal.

HUBERDEAU: Jonathan Huberdeau made some history last night. With an assist in Saint John’s first goal, Huberdeau became the Sea Dogs’ all-time leading scorer with 252 points scored in his career. He passed Michael Kirkpatrick’s 251 point mark, a plateau he tied last night.

Huberdeau added two other assists in the game, giving him 254 career points. The Sea Dogs captain now has 14 goals and 28 assists in 27 games this season.

MANTHA: Anthony Mantha, who scored a natural hat trick against Saint John earlier this season, was back at it last night. Mantha recorded two goals yesterday to give him a league best 25 on the season.

MacAULAY: Stephen MacAulay had two goals last night – both of which were scored on the power play. The 20-year old forward has scored 11 of his 15 goals this season on the man advantage.

2^nd PERIOD: It was a wild second period. Each team scored three goals in the 20-minute span. Shots were 13-11 in favour of Saint John.

DUDA: Steven Dudu registered his first QMJHL fight in the second period, dropping the gloves with fellow American Skyler Spiller. Duda didn't get many shots in.

DUREPOS: Pierre Durepos has made quite an impact since returning to the Sea Dogs lineup. The 20-year old defenseman had a goal and two assists last night to give him two goals and four assists in just four games this year.

GAGNE: While Durepos has been solid offensively lately, so has fellow 20-year old defenseman Kevin Gagne. He had two goals and an assist last night to give him eight goals and 19 assists in 23 games this year. He has registered five goals and six assists in his past five games.

FOURNIER: Well, things just haven’t gone Alex Fournier’s way this season. The Sea Dogs goaltender entered the game with a 0-3-0-0 record to go along with a 7.50 goals against average and a 0.792 save percentage. He allowed seven goals on 33 shots in last night’s loss to drop him to 0-4-0-0 with a 7.38 GAA and 0.791 SV%.

This was the fourth time this season that Fournier allowed six or more goals in a game.

HIGHMORE: Matthew Highmore, the eighth overall pick in the QMJHL Entry Draft in June, recorded his first QMJHL point last night. He assisted on Kevin Gagne’s game-tying goal in the third period. Highmore finished with two shots, a -1 rating, and went 7/12 on faceoffs.

STREAK: Last night’s loss ended Saint John’s four-game winning streak. It was their first loss since November 16 against Cape Breton.

STANDINGS: The Sea Dogs fell to 14-13-0-0 with the loss and still sit fourth overall in the Telus Maritimes Division and 12^th overall in the QMJHL with 28 points.

NOTES: This was the final meeting of the regular season between the two. Val-d’Or won both games and scored seven goals in each… the Telus webcast was horrible in the early going. Eventually got better… Stephen MacAulay had four shots… David Weckworth had two hits… Fredericton native Matt Murphy had two assists and was a +3… Anthony Mantha had six shots… Murphy had two hits… Saint John’s power play went 4-for-10 last night.

OUT OF TOWN: This was the only game in the QMJHL last night.

NEXT GAME: The Sea Dogs host the Rimouski Oceanic on Sunday at 3pm.

Photo: Foreurs website