Thursday, November 18, 2021

Recap: Sea Dogs lose 5-3

FINAL: Saint John 3, Gatineau 5
GATINEAU, Que.
- The Saint John Sea Dogs' first trip to the Slush Puppie Centre did not go as hoped.

The Sea Dogs recovered from a rough start but could not quite match the Gatineau Olympiques' offense, falling 5-3 on Wednesday night. This was the first match of a three-game Quebec road trip for Saint John.

Bad starts were a problem on Saint John's last road trip and those issues crept up again Wednesday. The Olympiques scored just 27 seconds in and were outshooting Saint John 13-1 before Josh Lawrence's shorthanded goal at 6:28.

Saint John struggled to match Gatineau in terms of shots and quality chances. The Olympiques entered the game with the best shots per game average in the league and it showed.

Lawrence had two goals and an assist to lead Saint John. William Dufour also scored. Jonathan Lemieux made 37 saves in the loss.

Gatineau goals came from Jonah De Simone, Antonin Verreault, Mathieu Bizier, Manix Landry and Samuel Savoie. Remi Poirier made 26 saves in the win.

LINEUP
Burns - Lawrence - Dufour
Sapelnikov - Reynolds - Francis
Picard - MacDonald - Bezeau
Crete - Chantler - Savoie

DesRoches - Villeneuve
Poirier - Inniss
Drapeau - Despont

Lemieux
Patenaude

SCRATCHES: The Sea Dogs were without defenseman Hunter Gartley along with forwards Cole Foston, Carter McCluskey, Adam Bowness and Nico Laforge.

CHANGES: The only change the Sea Dogs had in their lineup was replacing Hunter Gartley with Vincent Despont. Yanic Crete and Jacob Chantler saw very little ice time in the second half of the game with Charles Savoie moving up the lineup.

NEW SIGHTS: This was Saint John's first game in the Olympiques' new home. The Olympiques improved to 6-1-1-1 at the Slush Puppie Centre with the victory. This was also Saint John's first visit to Gatineau in nearly two years.

DEAN RETURNS: Vegas Golden Knights prospect Zach Dean made his regular season debut with the Olympiques on Wednesday. He'd been with the Golden Knights rehabbing an injury. He had one assist and two shots.

LAWRENCE: Josh Lawrence is on fire right now. With two goals and an assist on Wednesday, Lawrence now has three goals and five assists in his past three games. He extended his assists streak to six games and road points streak to eight.

SPECIAL TEAMS: It was a funky night for special teams. Saint John scored a power play goal (on only two opportunities) and a shorthanded goal while the Olympiques went 1-for-6 on the man advantage (although some of those were very late in the game). Saint John has now scored two shorthanded goals this season.
GOAL OF THE YEAR?: Unfortunately for the Sea Dogs, we'll be seeing this highlight a lot over the next few months.
NOTES: There was a ceremony before the game to honour health care workers... the attendance of 4,033 was the biggest crowd at the Slush Puppie Centre so far this season... Canadian national junior team head coach Dave Cameron was in attendance... William Dufour now leads the league in goals with 16 and is third in points with 29... Cam MacDonald and Evgenii Kashnikov dropped the gloves in the third period but were separated by the officials before the fight could start - something we haven't seen as much of this season.

NEXT GAME: The Sea Dogs travel to Val-d'Or to face the Foreurs on Friday at 8 p.m.

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