QUEBEC CITY P.Q.— If the first game is a good indication of what the fans in the QMJHL should expect of the QMJHL final between Shawinigan Cataractes and the Drummondville Voltigeurs, it promise to be an exciting one. Two goals by Yannick Riendeau helped the Voltigeurs to win the first battle of this series between these two teams. Drummondville head coach Guy Boucher has lots of good things to say about his players and the crowd that came to see the first game in Marcel Dionne center. Ask if he was satisfied of his team first victory his answer was, “Satisfy, never, but happy yes. It was the war tonight we blocked lots of shots, we paid the price. It was a game where both teams were very nervous, the fans help us. But frankly, it was very intimidate I don’t remembered once when the players step on the ice to have as strong as an atmosphere like tonight.” “Thanks to the fans, when we were good in the penalty killing situations, the fans le us know it by being behind us by encouraging us by letting us know we have the momentum. We want to let you know that we did that for you fans and just hope you like the way our players did it tonight. I told several times, Marco Cousineau is good under pressure he can do the job. He kept us in the game, the time we chase our nervousness.” Lots of people talked about the Drummondville offensive but the Voltigeurs can play very well defensively. “Honestly I’m very proud of that. Not just the defenseman but our forwards came back helping our defense. We didn’t gave the two-on-one, we have only two three-on- two against us tonight. Against a team like that, it’s an exploit.” Boucher said. “What I like the most tonight is Prokop. We always talk about Kulikov (Dmitry) but Patrick Prokop calm everyone in the dressing room. He won last year it isn’t for nothing, he was the best Gatineau defenseman last year, and for me tonight he was a real leader.” Drummondville coach said after the game. Referring to the five-on-three his team killed with success the Voltigeurs coach was the first to praise his players. “Yeah we said it before the game that we should be good in those situations. We got some power plays against them but I expect to not get too much power play, I expect both teams will be very cautious about penalties. We expect to have three or four penalties on each side. We have lots of things left to do in that series we are far away of accomplish something.” The battle of the 55th between Shawinigan Cataractes and Drummondville Voltigeurs began on Friday night without seeing neither teams being able to get the first goal in the opening period. Lots of people expectations were to see the Voltigeurs getting the tempo by driving the net and tested Cataractes netminder Timo Pielmeier. Instead, Shawinigan drive the net getting good scoring chances but Marco Cousineau was there making 19 saves on 19 shots. The Cataractes got first 14 shots inside first 12 minutes. Mike Hoffman missed the best Drummondville scoring chance when his shot missed the net left empty by Pielmeier after making first save. Samson Mahbod and Yannick Riendeau missed other Voltigeurs scoring opportunities in first period. Both teams got first chance on power play seeing the other goaltenders making good saves preventing the other team to get first goal in the game. Voltigeurs and Cataractes face each other seven times in playoff; this year is first time after the second round. Both teams won three times, Shawinigan won the last two series in 2002 (five games), in 2004 (seven games). Both teams face each other in round robin tournament (1987 won by the Cataractes). Drummondville began the second period with a man advantage following a penalty to Cataractes defenseman Mathieu Bolduc (0:46). Marc-Antoine Desnoyers missed another great scoring opportunity missing another empty net. Shawinigan thought they scored the first goal in second period, but the referee wave it off signaling a penalty to Cataractes defenseman Simon Lacroix instead. Turning point for Drummondville in second period came when Shawinigan was unable to get on the scoreboard during 40 seconds of five-on-three penalties. Consecutive penalties to center Danny Masse (11:08) and defenseman Desnoyers (12:28) gave to Shawinigan a five-on-three power play for 40 seconds without being able to score. Finally Yannick Riendeau for Drummondville broke the ice in second tier with first of two goals for the night on a power play during a penalty to David Labrecque. Riendeau put the rebound shot from Gabriel Dumont behind Pielmeier at 17:38. After being dominated in shot on goal department in first period 18-10, the Voltigeurs got the best in shots department 12- 9 in second frames. Riendeau came back in third period with his second of the game at 11:30 becoming the goal that make the difference, completing the scoring for Drummondville assuring the Voltigeurs victory in this first game. Alex Grant with 26 seconds remaining in the game prevents his team to be shutout with the only Shawinigan goal in the game. Both teams will be back on the ice for the second game of that series on Saturday at 19:00. Shots on goals: by Shawinigan 38 Drummondville 34 Power plays by: Shawinigan 0-5 Drummondville 1-4 Three Stars of the game: 1-Marco Cousineau (Dru.) 2- Yannick Riendeau (Dru.) 3-Timo Pielmeier (Sha.) Contact the author at: serge.poulin@prohockeynews.com
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