QUEBEC CITY, P.Q. — Coming to Rimouski with a 2-0 lead in their best-of-seven President Cup final, Saint John scored two goals in a span of 56 seconds in the third period to seal the win. Seeing Rimouski cutting Sea Dogs lead to one goal for second time in the game Tomas Jurco’s goal sealed Oceanic’s fate to finally win game three 6-4 taking a serious hold on the QMJHL series 3-0.
After playing an exciting first period where each team scored once, Saint John had to wait almost the entire second period before scoring two goals with less than 2:00 remaining to the middle frame.
Trailing by two beginning the third period, Rimouski got on the scoreboard 18 seconds in bringing the Oceanic to only one goal difference. But striking back only 17 seconds later Saint John regained their two goals lead with only 1:31 gone in the third.
Thinking they had killed all Rimouski’s chances to come back in the game, Saint John seemed to relax a little but feeling their fans’ energy Serge Beausoleil team didn’t let the game go when Rimouski came back with next two goals in span of 5:02 bringing back the Oceanic to trail by only one with 3:55 remaining to the third period.
But the 11th goal of the playoff by Jurco shut down all Rimouski hope to get the equalizer and hope to win their first game in overtime.
Rimouski began the game on strong note shooting five times against only one for Saint John in first 13:34 of first period. Peter Straka with three great scoring opportunities and Alex Belzile forced Sea Dogs goalie to make key saves.
Charles-Olivier Roussel opened the scoring for Saint John on a three-on-one breakaway with a shot that went inside Jacob Gervais-Chouinard right post at 8:53.
Rimouski came back to tie the game 3:07 later on their third power plays of the period. Thinking he had made the save Sea Dogs netminder Mathieu Corbeil saw the shot from Oceanic defenseman Jerome Gauthier-Leduc, from the slot, sliding between his pads.
Already playing with a man advantage, Saint John took a penalty at 20:00 minutes mark of first period when Nathan Beaulieu has had to take direction of penalty box, beginning the second period playing four-on-four for 54 seconds and 1:08 with a man advantage.
Teams playing against Saint John can’t miss too many scoring opportunities. After seeing the Oceanic missing two-on-one, Sea Dogs regained the lead with two goals in 33 seconds apart with less than 2:00 left to the second period.
After Steven MacAulay’s goal on breakaway at 17:30 of middle frame beating Oceanic goalie short side with a wrist shot, Danick Gauthier scored Saint John third goals on a turnover at 18:03 giving a 3-1 lead to Sea Dogs over the Oceanic after forty minutes of play.
After seeing his starting netminder being beaten twice in span of 56 seconds Rimouski head coach Serge Beausoleil decided to pull Gervais-Chouinard (5 goals on 20 shots) sending Carl Hozjan in to finish the game.
Rimouski brought back hope to their fans in the building with a goal with only 18 seconds in. Alexandre Mallet tip a puck in from Peter Trainor cutting Sea Dogs lead to only one goal.
Stanislav Galiev restored Saint John two goals lead 17 seconds later on a give-and-go with Jurco.
Gauthier scored his second goal of the game on a turnover when the pass from Jakub Culek went directly of Gauthier’s stick. The Sea Dogs center beat Gervais-Chouinard on a breakaway five-hole 1:31 into the third period.
With Saint John getting their two-goal lead back 1:31 into the third period, the Oceanic came back scoring next two goals trailing only by one goal for third times in the game with Saint John leading 5-4 with 3:55 remaining.
But Saint John strike back scoring goal number six with Tomas Jurco 11th of the playoff at 18:01 but not before referees had to go on video to review the goal thinking the Sea Dogs right winger had made a kicking motion pushing the puck behind Hozjan.
After reviewing the play, referees David Bedard and Jonathan Langeville allowed the goal putting all Oceanic hope of tying the game to force the overtime to rest.
Both teams will be back on the ice Thursday night in Rimouski with the possibility of seeing Rimouski being eliminated in front of their fans.
Contact the author at: serge.poulin@prohockeynews.com
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