(Laval) One could wonder how the Laval Rocket players were going to recover from their heartbreaking defeat on Friday night in a shootout against the Hartford Wolf Pack. However, against the same rival, they reacted brilliantly.
Riley Kidney had the best game of his young American League career, goaltender Jakub Dobes offered a second quality performance in as many days and the Rocket defeated the Wolf Pack 5-1 on Saturday afternoon in front of 10,268 spectators at Place Bell.
“Very satisfied,” said head coach Jean-François Houle about this victory which put an end to an ugly streak of nine losses.
“Through the series of defeats, we deserved victories. When it gets longer, and it gets longer, it’s hard mentally for the players and the instructors too. It sure does good, that one,” admitted Houle.
“It was one of our good matches,” he later opined. 60 minutes, throughout the match, yes. »
Kidney, a 20-year-old forward, led the Laval attack with two goals and an assist. He scored the Rocket’s first goal, early in the first period, and added his fifth of the season midway through the second period.
Kidney also had an assist on Nolan Yaremko’s goal, scored late in the second period against goaltender Olaf Lindbom, who faced 29 shots.
Brandon Gignac also had a strong match. He scored what would become the game-winning goal shorthanded in the second period and added an assist.
Jared Davidson collected his second of the season late in the third period.
As for Dobes, he blocked 25 pucks and only gave in to defender Blake Hillman on a shot that gave him no chance in the first period.
“It was a great team effort. We were solid for 60 minutes. We knew how important it was for us. It’s nice to have gone for victory. Now let’s hope we can line up a few,” commented Kidney.
The Rocket players will benefit from a slight break, at least in terms of the regular season schedule. Next Friday, they will be in Lehigh Valley to face the Phantoms in the first of a three-game road series.
And the doggies are raining!
It was “doggie throwing” day and the spectators making up the packed house at Place Bell did not have to wait very long before doing so.
They did it in spades – they posted a “team record” of 12,402 doggies – and at exactly 4:45 of the first period. Kidney pounced on the return of a Logan Mailloux shot that hit the vertical post to Lindbom’s right.
Kidney’s goal allowed the Rocket to make it 1-1 about two minutes after the visitors took the lead on their first shot of the match, that of Hillman who hit William Trudeau in passing, before destabilizing Dobes .
The rest of the period was marked by a potentially crucial and above all very dangerous game.
Xavier Simoneau was the victim of a violent head check from Matt Rempe, a six-foot-seven, 207-pound colossus, with just under five minutes remaining.
Simoneau, who returned to the game early in the second period, was in the corner of the ice, to Dobes’ left, attempting to make a play with the puck when Rempe walked towards him and hit.
The replay of the sequence clearly showed that Rempe’s skates were not in contact with the ice at the time of the check.
Officials originally did not call a violation on the play. After consultation, they assessed the Wolf Pack player a match penalty, along with a five-minute major.
However, the Rocket failed to capitalize on this golden opportunity, settling for two low-danger shots at Lindbom’s net.
Despite their failures during their five-minute power play, the Rocket players did not give up. Quite the contrary.
Instead, they responded with panache, scoring twice in just over two minutes early in the second period.
Gignac first hit the target shorthanded at 6:03, and Kidney scored his second of the afternoon at 8:32 following a two-on-one push with Philippe Maillet.
With a 3-1 lead, like the day before and around the same time of the match, the Rocket players, this time, scored the next important goal that had eluded them on Friday.
This goal came from Yaremko, assisted by Gignac and Kidney with a little over two minutes left in the middle period.
In the third period, the Rocket resisted a three-on-five sequence for 86 seconds, against the team at the top of the American League in terms of power play efficiency.
“Unbelievable,” Dobes said of his teammates’ work during the two-man penalty kill.
“I didn’t even need to be there. The guys blocked everything. I don’t even know if I had to make a stop. Good work from the instructors and a lot of courage to throw themselves in front of the shots,” analyzed the friendly goalkeeper.
Davidson added the icing on the sundae by deflecting a Joshua Roy shot during a power play with 4:47 remaining.