Recap: Sea Dogs win 4-3

FINAL: Cape Breton 3, Saint John 4

Michael Hawkins/Saint John Sea Dogs

SAINT JOHN - Brady Burns watched the Cape Breton Eagles score the overtime winner from the penalty box on Wednesday, 

On Friday, Burns scored the game-winning goal at 18:37 of the third period to lift the Saint John Sea Dogs to a 4-3 victory over the Eagles at TD Station.

Burns scored a pair of goals for Saint John and added an assist while Cam MacDonald and Connor Trenholm also scored. Vince Elie had two helpers while Ventsislav Shingarov made 32 saves in the win.

Charles Boutin, Olivier Houde and Samuel Johnson scored for Cape Breton in what was a back-and-forth affair with a few lead changes. Nicolas Ruccia made 36 saves in the loss.

The Eagles opened the scoring at 9:08 of the second period when Boutin grabbed the puck in the neutral zone, skated around Nicolas Bilodeau and then ripped a shot top corner past Shingarov.

Saint John went to a 5-on-3 power play at 16:09, which allowed them to retake the momentum. At 16:32, Burns fired a shot from the top of the circle that beat Ruccia blocker side to tie things up at 1-1.

MacDonald scored on a power play at 6:02 of the third, firing a shot from the point through some traffic to give Saint John their first lead of the night.

Nico Laforge took a double minor for high sticking at 9:57 and the Eagles quickly converted. At 10:13, Houde put in the rebound of a low point shot to make it a 2-2 game.

Cape Breton retook the lead at 13:57. On a two-on-one, Boutin made a nice feed to Johnson through some traffic who tapped the puck past Shingarov to make it 3-2 Eagles. Saint John would tie the game again at 15:49 when, after an Eagles turnover, Burns fed Trenholm down low who beat Ruccia in tight.

With 1:23 remaining, Elie crossed the line and then fed Burns in the high slot who made no mistake, ripping a wrist shot past Ruccia to give Saint John a 4-3 lead.

LINEUP

Burns - Trenholm - Elie

Simek - Burbidge - Mateiko

Laforge - Cournoyer - Reinhart

Szczerba - Beaulieu

Tivey - MacDonald

Bilodeau - Cosman

Akkouche - Tracey

Welsh

Shingarov

Brideau

SCRATCHES: The Sea Dogs were without goaltender Nikolas Hurtubise (injury); defensemen Charlie DesRoches (injury), Jeremie Richard (injury) and Vincent Despont (Switzerland world junior training camp); and forwards Peter Reynolds (injury) and Sam-Luca Thifault (injury).

MACDONALD: Forward Cam MacDonald, who has been used as a defenseman at times in recent games, was slotted into Saint John's top pairing with Nate Tivey. Even with Charlie DesRoches, Jeremie Richard and Vincent Despont unavilable, Saint John dressed seven defensemen (which included forwards MacDonald and Danny Akkouche). MacDonald was the lone "defenseman" the Sea Dogs had on their top power play unit.

BURNS: After scoring his 100th career QMJHL goal on Wednesday in Cape Breton, Brady Burns followed that up with a three-point night on Friday - which included the game-winning goal. Burns had two goals and an assist to go along with five shots in the victory. There was some nastiness at the end of the game between the two teams and Burns was given a game misconduct for "discriminatory taunts, gestures and slurs."

NOTES: Former Sea Dogs forward Carter McCluskey was a healthy scratch... Quispamsis natives Owen Arnold and Angelo Fullerton both did solo laps at the start of warmups. This was Cape Breton's first trip of the season to Saint John... Francois-James Buteau was hurt along the boards in first period but returned later on in the frame... members of the Finnish national junior team were in attendance. Finland faces the United States in pre-tournament play on Monday in Quispamsis... Eriks Mateiko had four of Saint John's 11 shots in the first period. He finished the game with seven shots... even as a defenseman, Cam MacDonald took 19 faceoffs... attendance was 2,241.

HIGHLIGHTS

NEXT GAME: The Sea Dogs and Eagles meet again on Saturday night at 7 p.m. at TD Station.