QUEBEC CITY, P.Q. — Joel Champagne turned off the lights in le Colisee Pepsi with a five-on-three power play goal with 1:12 remaining in overtime. With the victory Quebec began their series of two games in less than twenty-four hours before the Christmas break on a winning note before going to Chicoutimi on Saturday afternoon.
With the score in Quebec favor (2-1) after dominating the second period 17- 8 in shots on goal and 27- 13 after forty minutes, the Remparts were in good position to win. But with 7:35 remaining in the third period Mathieu Guertin tied the game 2-2 with a wrist shot from the slot beating Louis Domingue on his stick side bringing both teams back to square one.
With the score tied and only 41 seconds left to the game, Drummondville was caught with too many men on the ice giving a power play to Quebec for the rest of the period. With only 21 seconds gone in the overtime, Drummondville defenseman Jean-Philippe Mathieu was sent to the box for tripping after losing his stick.
Quebec couldn’t have asked for a better opportunity to put an end to this game when veteran center Joel Champagne completed the tic-tac-toe play near the goalmouth by pushing the puck behind Guillaume Nadeau with 1:12 to go in overtime.
“We reacted pretty well tonight because we missed several players who left for World junior championship. The lines weren’t the same but everyone took their places and played good game,” said Champagne of the game winning goal after the game.
“It was a special game after the crowd threw their doggies on the ice thinking we scored our first goal, those two disallowed goals broke the rhythm little bit, but everything seemed to come back in second and third,” Champagne said. “We have had three power plays in first period without being able to score nothing seem to worked but as the game went on we made some adjustment and everything went to work.”
Drummondville opened the scoring on their first shot on goal. Mitchell Robillard beat Domingue top shelve with a shot from right faceoff circle with 2:02 into the opening period. Quebec got the advantage in shots on goal 10-5 but trailing by one on the main scoreboard 1-0 after first twenty minutes.
Quebec came back playing much better hockey in middle frame, not because they scored twice but because they had the territorial advantage forcing the Voltigeurs netminder to make key saves.
Martin Lefebvre tied the score 1-1 with a wrist shot giving no chance to Drummondville goaltender Nadeau at 16:33. Quebec took the lead for the first time in the game with Frederick Roy power play goal. Another tic-tac-toe play, Mirko Hoefflin and Champagne got the helpers on Roy 12th of the year at 19:37.
Drummondville left winger Mathieu Guertin pushed both teams into overtime with his eighth of the regular season at 7:35.
“I don’t like the word bad (penalty), I think we had good intention, our player would launch the attack, it wasn’t the best moment to re-launch the attack because we were in a change-up but it was a good intention,” said Drummondville head coach Mario Duhamel about his team’s penalty with 41 seconds remaining in the third period.
“The player already lost his stick so he didn’t want to give a free scoring chance. We better off taking a penalty than giving a free scoring chance. We should get a break after that on Randazo (Andrew) who lost his stick on a slashing but we should give credit to Quebec, they have great power play and they made us look bad with their two power plays goal,” Duhamel said.
Talking about his goaltender, the Voltigeurs head coach recognize his great work.
“Guillaume (Nadeau) has been excellent tonight. For us tonight it was very important, it was our first game here, we have lots of young guys in our lineup lots of players for whom it was their first experience so it’s always difficult for a first time. We managed it pretty well, after a first period where we didn’t played very well, we came back with much better effort in second and third period,” Duhamel said. “We won much more one-on-one battle along the board, but against the Remparts you know you should stay five-on-five. We had a power play at the end of the game but it turn out on the other side.”
“The role of several players changes with players left for the world junior championship,” Quebec head coach Patrick Roy said after the game. “But we effectively were much better in second period we have had lots of good scoring chances but Nadeau ( Drummondville goaltender) made several key saves to keep the game where it was. But overall I’m happy about team performance. For sure when you missed four important players in your lineup it played on the dept of your team, the young guys played good game tonight.”
Quebec will play their last game before Christmas break tomorrow (Saturday) afternoon 4:00 PM.
Contact the author at: serge.poulin@prohockeynews.com
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