ROUGH START TO ROAD TRIP

STATION NATION POST-GAME

The Saint John Sea Dogs started their road trip on a rough note, falling 7-4 to the Montreal Junior on Friday night at Verdun Auditorium.

Montreal opened the scoring just 36 seconds into the opening frame. Former Cape Breton Screaming Eagle and current Montreal captain Nicholas Chouinard scored his fifth off of a mad scramble in the crease that had Sea Dogs goalie Marc-Antoine Gelinas upset.

Alexandre Leduc had two terrific scoring chances but Jean-Francois Berube stood tall and smothered the puck.

Yann Sauve tied the game 1-1 at 6:27. He took a pass from Michael Kirkpatrick and ripped a slap shot from the right face-off circle that beat Berube on the power play.

Saint John took a brief 2-1 lead at 8:31 when overage forward Alexandre Leduc scored off of a nice give-and-go with Stanislav Galiev and Danick Gauthier. Leduc, a native of Verdun, was given a roaring cheer from a section of fans at the Auditorium.

At 10:23 Loic Poudrier scored his first goal to give Montreal a 3-2 lead. He took a weak swing at lose puck in front of the net that went between the pads of Gelinas.

Just 57 seconds later the Junior took a two goal lead when Stephen McAuley turned the puck over and Marc-Andre Levasseur scored to make it 4-2.

At 12:12 Loic Poudrier scored the easiest goal he’ll ever score. Rookie defenseman Gabriel Bourret tried to chip the puck off of the glass but deflected off of stick of Poudrier and into the net.

Zach Phillips shortened the Junior lead to one goal when he scored a beauty at 17:05. Phillips made a nifty dangle around David Foucher and beat Berube high glove side for his second of the season.

Saint John led Montreal in shots after one period 16-9.

Chris Thorne opened the second period scoring when a deflected pass at the Junior blue line went on to his stick after a line change. He went in on a breakaway and beat Gelinas. Gelinas was pulled in favour of Karel St-Laurent following the goal.

At 15:28 Steven Anthony made it a one goal game again on the power play. He beat Berube up and over his shoulder with assists going to Kirkpatrick and Nathan Beaulieu.

Anthony had a great chance as the horn sounded to end the second period. Saint John led in shots after two periods 24-18.

Eliezer Sherbatov made it 6-4 when a centering attempt down low went off the skate of Beaulieu and between the legs of St-Laurent at 3:37.

Olivier Oullet left the game shortly after taking a shot in the leg but did return.

Yann Sauve hammered Evgeny Solomonov with a huge hit. Solomonov left the game without putting any weight on his leg.

At 10:43 Sauve took down Pier-Antoine Dion with his stick and was given a penalty shot. St-Laurent made a great pad save to keep it 6-4 Montreal.

Berube was equally as good in his end robbing Galiev of a sure goal.

It looked as though Jeremy Gouchie may have beaten St-Laurent but video review proved otherwise.

Saint John pulled St-Laurent with 1:05 remaining. Sherbatov slipped it into the empty net to ice the game for a final of 7-4 Montreal.

Gelinas took the loss falling to 2-2-0. Berube got the win improving to 2-1-0 on the season.

NOTES: The attenadnce was 3,122... the teams overager situation is certainly becoming a problem with nobody seeming to want to step-up… Karel St-Laurent was good in relief of Marc-Antoine Gelinas... Saint John improved its special teams greatly going 2/5 on the power play and keeping Montreal to 0/4 on extra man oppertunities.

NEXT GAME: Saint John Sea Dogs vs Shawinigan Cataractes. Saturday, October 3, 2009 at 5:00 pm at Bionest Centre.