Saturday, June 25, 2022

Recap: Sea Dogs win 5-3

FINAL: Saint John 5, Shawinigan 3
Michael Hawkins/Saint John Sea Dogs
SAINT JOHN - A legendary performance by William Dufour has pushed the Saint John Sea Dogs into Wednesday's Memorial Cup championship game.

Dufour scored four goals - including a natural hat trick in the second period - to lift the Sea Dogs to an unbelievable 5-3 victory over the Shawinigan Cataractes on Saturday at TD Station. It was the final game of the round-robin with the Sea Dogs earning a bye straight to Wednesday's final. The Cataractes are now forced to play in Monday's semifinal against the Hamilton Bullodgs.

The Sea Dogs trailed 3-0 after what was a mess of a first period for the Sea Dogs. But the second frame was a complete reversal with Saint John scoring four times and outshooting Shawinigan 21-5.

Jeremie Poirier scored Saint John's other goal while Josh Lawrence had a pair of assists. Nikolas Hurtubise had a strong performance in net, making 26 stops in the win.

Loris Rafanomezantsoa, Olivier Nadeau and William Veillette scored for Shawinigan. Antoine Coulombe made 31 saves in the loss.

Rafanomezantsoa opened the scoring just 49 seconds into the opening frame, firing a point shot that beat Hurtubise five-hole.

After the goal, it was all Saint John for a couple minutes. Slowly, the Cataractes started to regain momentum. Hurtubise made an excellent stop off of Maximilien Ledoux with around 7:30 remaining in the frame.

Hurtubise came up huge again a couple minutes later, making a big save off of a Mavrik Bourque chance in front. The puck came back to the point where a Zachary Massicotte point shot was redirected by Nadeau at 14:33, making it 2-0.
Shawinigan took a 3-0 lead at 19:17 when Veillette grabbed a loose puck and beat Hurtubise with a backhand shot.

The Cataractes nearly made it 4-0 late in the period. With Ryan Francis in the box for roughing, Xavier Bourgault ripped a shot off the post.

Saint John got on the board 2:02 into the second period. William Villeneuve was in the slot and sent a feed to Dufour who one-timed the puck from the circle past Coulombe. Then just 21 seconds later, Dufour scored again, beating Coulombe glove side to make it 3-2.

After failing to score on back-to-back power plays, Dufour completed his natural hat trick at even strength at 8:38. The New York Islanders prospect cut through the crease and batted the puck in, tying the game at 3-3.

Saint John had 25 seconds of five-on-three power play time at 13:08. The Dogs couldn't connect on the two-man advantage but finally, at 14:12, the power play broke through with a five-on-four goal from Poirier to give the Dogs their first lead of the night.

Saint John got into some penalty trouble late in the second but successfully killed off back-to-back Shawinigan power plays to carry a 4-3 lead into the third.

Dufour scored his fourth of the game at 1:57 of the third, giving Saint John some insurance.

Shawinigan pulled Coulombe with 2:50 remaining and applied some strong offensive zone pressure but they could not beat Hurtubise.

LINEUP
Burns - Lawrence - Dufour
Ansons - Daoust - Francis
Reynolds - MacDonald - Bezeau
Picard - Trenholm - Lessard

Sevigny - Villeneuve
Kuznetsov - Poirier
Drapeau - DesRoches

Hurtubise
Couture

SCRATCHES: The Sea Dogs were without goaltender Noah Patenaude; forwards Nico Laforge, Jacob Chantler and Nicholas Blagden; and defensemen Hunter Gartley, Vincent Despont and Zach Welsh.

PRE-GAME: The ceremonial puck drop was performed by former Sea Dogs defenseman Nathan Beaulieu, who happened to play in the last Saint John-Shawinigan game at a Memorial Cup tournament.

CLOCK PROBS: There were clearly some major problems with the scoreboard before and during the game, forcing the on-ice officials to use their whistles to indicate when warmup came to an end. The clock came to life just before puck drop but died a few times during the game. A digital score bug was placed on the video boards above the scoreboard.

ROUGH FIRST: After giving up the first goal just 49 seconds in, the Sea Dogs started to take control of the game. But after the first TV break, it was all Shawinigan. Shots were 10-4 Sea Dogs at that TV break but they ended 15-10 in favour of the Cataractes. Shawinigan led 3-0.

DUFOUR: What a night for William Dufour. The New York Islanders prospected netted a natural hat trick in the second period and added another goal in the third. It's the second time this season that Dufour has scored four goals in a game. The record for most goals in a Memorial Cup game is five. Dufour also had 15 shots on goal, which is simply insane.
SPECIAL TEAMS: Saint John's special teams have struggled in this tournament but they turned it around in this game. Saint John killed off all four Shawinigan power plays and they finally scored on the man advantage, going 1/6.

PACKED HOUSE: For the first time this tournament, TD Station was sold out. Attendance was 5,657. It's the first time TD Station has been sold out in the COVID era.

NOTES: All four on-ice officials were from the QMJHL... both Yan Kuznetsov and Philippe Daoust took hands/sticks to the face at points during the game and were in some pain... Ryan Francis was called for three minor penalties... Jeremie Poirier had six shots... Mavrik Bourque and Pierrick Dube each had five shots for Shawinigan.

HIGHLIGHTS

NEXT GAME: The Sea Dogs will play either the Hamilton Bulldogs or Shawinigan Cataractes in Wednesday's championship game.
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