RECAP: Sea Dogs Win 5-1

FINAL: Saint John 5, Bathurst 1

BATHURST – The losing skid is over.

The Saint John Sea Dogs (21-10-1-4) ended a four-game losing streak on Monday night at KC Irving Regional Centre by defeating the Acadie-Bathurst Titan (10-24-4-1) 5-1.

Mitchell Dempsey, Justice Dundas, Matthew Green, Spencer Smallman and Braydon Blight scored for Saint John in the victory while Sebastien Auger made 27 saves in the win.

Jordan Maher’s power play goal late in the first period was all the Titan could register on this night. Backup netminder Alexandre Lagace made 25 stops in the loss.

It was a fairly uneventful first period until Dempsey opened the scoring at 11:00, finishing off a give-and-go with Dundas by beating Lagace upstairs.

Dundas made it 2-0 Sea Dogs just three minutes later, beating Lagace glove side and giving the overage forward his second point of the period.

Dundas’ eventful period continued at 17:18 when he was called for slashing, sending the Titan to the power play. Bathurst would get on the board during the man advantage at 18:51 as Aaron Kerr sent a nice pass to Maher who beat Auger to make it a 2-1 contest.

Shots were 11-7 in favour of Bathurst in the first period.

Like the first, there wasn’t a whole lot going on in the early goings of the second period. Matthew Green changed that at 8:42, depositing a Julien Tessier rebound past Lagace for his first QMJHL goal. That made it a 3-1 Saint John lead.

Soon after Auger made a big save off a Raphael Corriveau shot, the Titan headed back to the power play at 16:37. On the man advantage, it would be Saint John scoring. After the Titan took too long to set up for a faceoff, Matthew Highmore took the puck after it was dropped and fed Smallman for a breakaway. Smallman made no mistake to give Saint John a 4-1 advantage.

Shots in the second stanza were 11-10 in favour of Bathurst.

In the third, Blight gave the Sea Dogs a 5-1 lead at 4:27. It was his first QMJHL goal.

The rest of the third period was whatev. Shots were 13-6 in favour of Saint John in the third and 30-28 Sea Dogs overall.

TURNING POINT/BIG MOMENT

Spencer Smallman’s shorthanded goal late in the second period gave Saint John a commanding three-goal lead and a big boost heading into the final frame.

SN PLAYER OF THE GAME

Matthew Green.

TWEET OF THE GAME

Things are looking very blight for the seadogs tonight #wewanteichel #congratsgreener #congratsblight #justicewasserved
— Shaun Chappel (@ShaunChappel77) December 30, 2014

STATS

NOTES

• The Sea Dogs were without forwards Samuel Dove-McFalls (upper body), Mathieu Joseph (suspension) and Alexander Kealey (body soreness) along with defensemen Jakub Zboril (suspension).
• Dove-McFalls was injured in Sunday’s game in Moncton. According to Tim Roszell, the injury is not believed to be serious. Meanwhile, Zboril received a one-game suspension for “kicking” in Sunday’s game.
• This was the second game of a stretch of three games in four days for both teams.
• Justice Dundas had his first multi-point game since Oct. 25.
• With an assist in this game, Luke Green now has three goals and two assists in his past three matches.
• Bailey Webster and Daniel Del Paggio were the only Sea Dogs to not record a shot on goal in the game.
• Webster and Jack vanBoekel are now the only Sea Dogs regulars without goals this season.
• Monday night game when Team Canada is playing. Let’s not do that again, QMJHL schedule people.

NEXT GAME

The Sea Dogs host the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles on New Year’s Eve (Wednesday) at 2 p.m.