LAVAL | The Rocket certainly had a frustrating final week, suffering three losses in games that all required overtime.
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The Laval residents first lost 4 to 3 and 3 to 2 in overtime against the Americans in Rochester on Wednesday and Friday. Then they lost 4-3 to the Syracuse Crunch on Saturday in a game that ended in a shootout.
“We have to find a way to win. We played well, but not well enough,” said assistant coach Kelly Buchberger after the team’s practice at Place Bell on Monday noon.
“Of course it’s a little disappointing, we wanted to get as many points as possible. Three out of six is not so bad, but I think we deserved a better outcome,” said defender Olivier Galipeau, who collected four assists during these three games.
“It’s quite frustrating to lose these three games because each time we fought for victory and it came down to just one goal,” added Riley Kidney.
Progress
A 26-year-old veteran who is in his third year with the Rocket, Galipeau believes that there are positives to take from these meetings despite the three losses.
“We are making progress,” he assures us. We had difficulty since the start of the year playing a good full 60 minutes and that’s what cost us matches.
“To have a constant effort for 60 minutes despite it being on the road and those being difficult matches, that’s a lot of progress.”
The team was also able to give its goalkeepers some breathing room by limiting the number of goals allowed, which had been a flaw too often in the previous fifteen meetings.
Development
The head coach, Jean-François Houle, has a lot. Mentioned at the start of the season that the role of the team was first to develop the many young players entrusted to it by the Montreal Canadiens.
But he also said that victory was a good way to develop young people.
“We want to win as much as we can even if our primary mandate is to develop players.
“We believe that winning means developing young people and victories help us move forward.”