QUEBEC CITY, P.Q. — Two power play goals by Quebec in 43 seconds (first with two-man advantage, second one with one man) to begin the third period paved the way to 6-4 come-from-behind victory for Quebec in front of 9,605 fans in le Colisee Pepsi.
Back from a three games in three nights road trip where Patrick Roy’s team lost the last one by shutout; the Remparts didn’t give up hope even as their opponent picked up two goals in 11 seconds in the first.
The game began with inconsistent play from both sides. Both teams only shot once with 14:03 remaining in the opening period. Gatineau scored the first two goals in 0:11 seconds, the first one at 8:53, the second came at 9:04.
Jean-Gabriel Pageau went between two Quebec defensemen (Alex Wall Mikael Tam) beating Quebec netminder Louis Domingue between his pads.
A turnover in the Quebec defensive zone led to Gatineau’s second goal. Benjamin Laliberte picked up a loose puck made a great pass to Mathieu Gagnon who passed to Jordan Bernier beating Domingue low on his stick side.
Quebec got their first goal when Olivier Hinse found a tiny hole between Olympiques’ goaltender Maxime Clermont 13:49 into first period.
Gatineau came back less than three minutes later scoring the third goal in the period and regaining a two goal lead. Taylor Burke scored his second of the regular season at 16:09.
The third goal yielded on seven shots by Domingue was the end of his night of work. Jimmy Appleby came in for the rest of the game making 15 saves out of 16 shots in 43:51 minutes of play.
Remparts head coach Roy took the blame for sending his veteran in the net.
“I will take the blame for sending Louis tonight because he didn’t feel well yesterday and today when I talked to him he said that he was ok. But I shouldn’t have sent Louis to begin the game; I should have gone with Jimmy (Appleby),” Roy said in his post game press conference.
A penalty to Burke for hooking 1:31 into second period gave Quebec another chance. A chance the Remparts didn’t miss when Mirko Hoefflin completed great plays by Ryan Bourque and Frederick Roy. Hoefflin’s goal came at 3:23.
But like in first period Gatineau came back less than three minutes later to regain the two-goal lead. Igor ,Levitsky unassisted, scored his fourth goals of the year. Gatineau was in the driver’s seat after two periods leading by two.
But two penalties inside nine seconds, first taken by defenseman Jason Seed for hooking 0:50 seconds into third period and the second one by Gagnon for delay of game at 0:59 seconds paved the way for the Quebec comeback.
Quebec scored four unanswered goals leading to a 6-4 win.
Quebec defenseman Vincent Barnard scored on a five-on-three power play. His one-timer beat Gatineau netminder low on his glove side 2:00. Bourque, 43 seconds later, brought both teams back to square one with his tenth goal of the season.
And with 7:43 remaining in the third period third line center Matthew Brown used mostly in defensive task scored his first of the year and that goal made the difference in the game becoming the game winning goal at 12:26.
Defenseman Mikael Tam completed the scoring for Quebec with the insurance goal at 19:17.
“It felt very good to get off my back,” were first words said by Brown following his first goal in 2010-11.
“It’s kind of frustrating, I had couple of sparse before but its lot easier to deal with it when you have 19 years old then at 16 years old,” Brown said responding to a question relating to the fact he didn’t have any goals in 24 games.
Appleby who relieved Domingue agreed with a reporter that his team has had a tough start, “We didn’t play our best to begin the game. But we showed lots of character like we did since the beginning of the season.”
“It’s different to come in the game like that, before a game we have much time to prepare when it’s your game. Sometime you don’t have lots of stress because it isn’t your game. It was the way I get in the game and do my best and it went well,” Appleby said.
“We didn’t begin the game properly in the first period,” admitted Quebec head coach Roy. “We had a great hockey lesson in Saint John last Sunday, But we didn’t begins the game the way we should have. We didn’t have our usual intensity, we didn’t have our usual forecheck but in the last seven or eight minutes of the second periods we began to play better we had several good chances, we put more pressure on their defensive. In third period the two penalties taken by Gatineau gave us some momentum but we were more intense.”
For his part Gatineau head coach Benoit Groulx was the first to recognize that his team works but his best players didn’t step up.
“We knew in the third period would try to come back and in these occasions you need your best players. You need to see your best players to step up and that was the difference tonight. We took advantage of the fact their goaltender didn’t seem to be in his game. They possibly saw our lineup (five to six players missing due to injuries) and has human they possibly took us lightly. The effort was there but we weren’t opportunistic tonight. It’s sad to lose a lead after two periods,” Groulx said.
Quebec will return to action tonight hosting the Lewiston MAINEiacs on Friday and Sunday November 21.
Contact the author at: serge.poulin@prohockeynews.com
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