Oct 17 Cape Breton Screaming Eagles Soar Past Montreal Juniors 3-2

The Eagles had landed. The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles, that is; and they brought their 10-3, second place record into the Verdun Auditorium to meet for the first time, the Montreal Juniors. As was mentioned in my previous article when Montreal defeated the Huskies, don't let the score fool you. The juniors would not soon forget this meeting that saw the Eagles dominate from the second period on as Montreal was not able to keep up with the Eagles, a team that played like a unit. Jake Allen did all he could to keep it close and Luke Adam tried to get the team back into it in the dying seconds with a goal, but Cape Breton would go on to defeat the Juniors in their own barn by a score of 3-2.

On paper, except for the standings, the teams seemed even in the stats department. The Eagles' away record of 5-3-2 was similar to the juniors' home record of 6-4-2. Both teams had a relatively modest power-play with the edge going to Cape Breton at 22% and both teams played the night before. Both teams had a reason to want to win this game more than the other. The eagles lost to the Victoriaville Tigres and needed this win if they wanted to maintain their quest for first place overall. The Juniors won their contest yesterday evening against the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies which put them a game over .500 and a win against a team ahead of them in the standings would increase those numbers as well as the confidence factor going forward.

The Screaming Eagles did what most teams do when they think they have an east win ahead of them, they started backup goaltender Olivier Roy instead of regular starter Christopher Holden. Montreal took no chances and went with Jake Allen. Both were tested early and both let in early goals. With barely 3 minutes gone in the first, Angelo Esposito set up TJ Brennan at the point with a pass from behind the net. Brennan wristed the floater over Holden's left shoulder, waking the goaltender out of his daydream. Only 47 seconds later, Jake Allen partially stopped a Vincent Lavigueur shot from the hash marks but the puck dribbled out from between his left arm and his body to trickle into the net. Allen, upset with himself, took a little skate to shake it off.

Allen would be the busiest of both goalies facing 15 shots in the period and came up big, 13 minutes into the period when Robert Slaney was allowed to waltz in on him and take 3 whacks at the puck before Allen could smother it and stop the play. Allen would again be called upon towards the end of the period when the Juniors were forced to kill a penalty after Angelo Esposito was ejected from the game for being the instigator in a fight as he went on to express his disapproval of the open ice hit Jan Piskacek laid on Luke Adam. The hit seemed clean, but regardless, Adam went to the dressing room for a once over and was back t start the 2nd.

The best chance the Juniors could muster in the 2nd period, a period in which the Juniors were outshot 22-4, came with less than 7 minutes remaining. A break-away opportunity was created  for Benjamin Rubin who pounced on a defensive zone give-away and made some nifty moves from forehand to backhand, but goalie Roy made a more impressive save to keep the game tied. As is usually the case when an opportunity is missed at one end, opportunity knocks at the other. With 5:06 remaining in the period, in the midst of a scrum to the left of Jake Allen, Michael Stinziani made a precise pass to team captain Chris Culligan who deflected his 7th of the season past a helpless Jake Allen who was the only reason the Juniors were still in it as the 2nd period ended. 

The wind officially went out of the Juniors' sails after Nick MacNeil took a pass from Robert Slaney, allowing him to skate in on Jake Allen and beat him with a nifty backhand over his left shoulder. MacNeil registered his 11th of the season with that Juniors backbreaker. After a time-out called by coach Pascal Vincent, the Juniors were able to mount a last minute comeback attempt and it almost came to fruition. Luke Adam was able to just put one past Olivier Roy off the scrum in front of the net. This goal, his 7th of the season came at 19:35 of the 3rd and the Juniors almost tied the contest with a flurry of shots on goal that didn't miss by much, but time had run out on the Juniors who have to ask themselves what the outcome of this game would have been if this aggressiveness was present for the last 2 periods.

The shots on goal alone (45-12) spoke the volumes that the score didn't. Were it not for Jake Allen, Montreal would have lost by a much larger margin. While their first periods  tend to border on greatness, the 2nd and 3rd leave much to be desired of late. Something that coach Pascal Vincent will no doubt be preaching to his troop today and for the next 6 days to come as they prepare to receive the Gatineau Olympiques on Friday the 24th. Pascal stated that "Some players think that they are bigger than they are and we are going to take care of that" citing perhaps that some of his veterans were not playing up to their potential. "I don't care who got drafted, if they won't work, they won't play" he later would go on to say. It will be interesting to see what the next few days of practise and meetings will do in reflection of these latest comments. We will know on Friday at 7:30 PM

The game's 3 stars, as chosen by yours truly were : 1 Chris Culligan (CB), 2 Jake Allen (Mtl), 3 Nick MacNeil (CP)   

Tags: Cape Breton Screaming Eagles \ Chris Culligan \ hockey \ Jake Allen \ LHJMQ \ Luke Adam \ Montreal juniors \ Nick MacNeil \ Pascal Vincent \ QMJHL \ TJ Brennan \ Verdun Auditorium