Recap: Sea Dogs lose 5-1

FINAL: Saint John 1, Newfoundland 5

Jeff Parsons/Newfoundland Regiment

ST. JOHN'S, NL - The Newfoundland Regiment completed the sweep on Thursday.

The Regiment defeated the Saint John Sea Dogs 5-1 at Mary Brown's Centre, taking all eight games in the season series. That includes four one-goal victories at TD Station.

Newfoundland, who are in a fight for playoff positioning in the middle of the standings, have now won five straight games overall. Saint John, meanwhile, have lost five straight and nine of their last 10.

It was a similar script to Wednesday's game as the Regiment grabbed a 3-0 lead in the first period. Saint John didn't have a bad second half of the game but they bad a big hole to dig themselves out of.

Alexis Joseph scored at 1:49 of the second and had a number of chances to cut the deficit more, even having a penalty shot that was stopped by Regiment goaltender Louis-Antoine Denault. The Newfoundland netminder made 27 saves in the win.

Benjamin Veitch, Blake Pilgrim-Edwards, Justin Larose, Maddex Marmulak and Louis-François Bélanger scored for Newfoundland. 

Arseni Radkov, who come on in relief of Rafaël Courchesne on Wednesday, made 25 saves in the loss.

LINEUP

Fullerton - Groulx - Donovan

Yared - Côté - Rozzi

Morin - Gauthier - Seymour

Héroux - Joseph

Wasmer - Duhamel

Drabczynski - Damphousse

Croteau - Baldwin

Dunlap

Radkov

Courchesne

SCRATCHES: The Sea Dogs were without forwards Olivers Murnieks (injury) and William Yared (injury) along with defensemen Cameron Chartrand (injury) and Carl-Otto Magnusson (serving first game of two-game suspension).

NOTES: The Sea Dogs once again dressed 11 forwards and seven defensemen... defenseman Carl-Otto Magnusson served the first game of a two-game suspension he received for being an aggressor in Wednesday's game... with Magnusson and Chartrand out, the Sea Dogs called up 16-year-old defenseman Jesse Dunlap, who has spent most of this season at Rothesay Netherwood. He made his QMJHL debut in this game. He put a big hit on Ryan Dwyer in the first period and also took a big hit later in the game... former Sea Dogs defenseman Patryk Zubek was in the Regiment lineup after being a healthy scratch the night before. He recored an assist, his first point as a member of the Regiment... just 1:36 in, Angelo Fullerton was given a five-minute major and match penalty for slew-footing, putting Saint John down to 10 forwards. The Regiment scored with seven seconds remaining in the power play... Maxime Côté and Blake Pilgrim-Edwards had a short fight near the end of the first period and both earned game misconducts. This was especially notable because it reduced Saint John to nine forwards for the rest of the night... Alexis Joseph had a team high five shots and was hearing "overrated" chants all night long... Joseph's penalty shot was Saint John's second penalty shot of the season... probably the most physical game of the season with both teams laying some huge hits. Hits were 18-16 Newfoundland... the Regiment are now 17-8-1-0 at home... attendance was 4,575. 

HIGHLIGHTS

NEXT GAME: The Sea Dogs host the Shawinigan Cataractes on Saturday at TD Station. Note this is a 3 p.m. start.