Spitfires move on to the Memorial Cup finals

RIMOUSKI, QC – Adam Henrique scored at 4:31 of overtime to give the Windsor Spitfires a 3-2 win over the Drummondville Voltigeurs in the 2009 MasterCard Memorial Cup semi-finals.

Drummondville goaltender Marco Cousineau was sensational as first star of the game in making 44 saves, including a breakaway on Dale Mitchell in the third period. The Spitfires outshot the Voltigeurs 47-21 in the game and 16-2 in the third period. In overtime Windsor outscored Drummondville 6-1 who came into the game injury filled and it showed throughout the game. Taylor Hall opened the scoring with his second goal of the tournament off of a give and go play with Mark Cundari at 15:47 of the first period when Hall put home a rebound for the 1-0 lead. It wouldn’t take long for Windsor to extend their lead when defenceman Ben Shutron came in from the point and took a pass from Eric Wellwood and fired a shot through the legs of Cousineau for a 2-0 lead at 18:02. The Voltigeurs fought back in the second period. Samson Mahbod scored from just in front of the Spitfire net at 1:13 who received a pass from Yannick Riendeau from behind the net. Riendeau tied the game on the power play at 15:10 when he put home a rebound off Dmitry Kulikov’s shot from the point with a two man advantage. Despite the third period onslaught, the game was sent into overtime thanks to Cousineau’s play in the net. Unfortunately for Drummondville, the Spitfires kept on coming. Henrique slammed home a rebound off of Taylor Hall’s initial shot and put the puck past Cousineau to send Windsor into sundays championship game against the Kelowna Rockets. Andrew Engelage was the winning goaltender who made 19 saves on the night. Hall was named second star of the game and Henrique was named the game’s third star. The Spitfires have now won three straight games. The Championship Final will be held on Sunday afternoon and will start at 4:30 pm est. Contact the author at Brian.Jennings@prohockeynews.com