ROCKET
Laval

4-3

DEVILS
Binghamton

Lineup

Forward lines and defense pairings: 

[one_half]Audette – Evans – Belzile
Kile – Chaput – Grenier
Jevpalovs – Vejdemo – Alain
Pezzetta – Verbeek – Adams-Moisan[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Alzner – Fleury
Ouellet – Lernout
Sklenicka – Lamarche[/one_half_last]

Goaltenders:
Lindgren
McNiven

Scratches:

Phelix Martineau, Adam Plant, Ryan Culkin, Marco Roy

Injury List:

Gustav Olofsson (shoulder), Noah Juulsen (eye), Michael McCarron (shoulder), Antoine Waked (upper body injury), Hunter Shinkaruk (upper body injury)

Game Report

On a balmy Friday night in Binghamton, NY, the Laval Rocket settled in for the first of back-to-back games against the Devils. After dropping their last seven consecutive games, and finding themselves back in the basement of the North Division, the Rocket were in desperate need of a win.

Michael Chaput made his return to the Laval lineup on this night, after clearing waivers on Wednesday. Charlie Lindgren took his place between the pipes for the second game in a row.

The Rocket came out with visible energy early in the opening frame, pressuring the Devils in the offensive zone and getting pucks on Cam Johnson. After about 10 minutes, though, both teams seemed to settle down a bit and Laval looked to fall back on bad habits.

Alexandre Alain changed all of that, however, when he got in tight on Johnson and deflected the puck up and over the netminder and into the goal behind him. Just about a minute and a half later, Alexandre Grenier took advantage of a Binghamton turnover in their own end and scored an unassisted goal to make it 2-0 at the end of 20 minutes.

Alex Belzile extended the Laval lead to 3-0 in the second period when he smoothly picked the pocket of Ryan Murphy before taking the puck to the paint and beating Johnson easily. However, once the two teams started exchanging penalties, the Rocket began to wear down a bit. John Quenneville took full advantage on one of the Binghamton power plays and got his team on the board, 3-1.

Just when it looked like that was going to be the score heading into the second intermission, the Devils got a power play opportunity very late in the period – and capitalized on it. With just 1.2 seconds left, Colton White‘s point shot made its way past Lindgren to pull the Devils within one goal.

The third period was a grind, with Binghamton gaining the upper hand in shots on goal. Physicality took a noticeable upward swing, but the refs didn’t call a single penalty in the final frame. The Devils looked to even the score plenty of times, but Daniel Audette managed to pot an empty netter with just over two minutes left in the game to seemingly put the game out of reach.

Quenneville, however, had other ideas and found the back of the net for the second time in the game with 21 seconds remaining on the clock. But Laval held out, snapping their seven-game losing streak with a much-needed victory.

The Rocket were in good spirits following this game, and rightfully so. They’ll look to carry that positive vibe and good momentum forward into Saturday night’s rematch against the Binghamton Devils.

Plus/Minus

▲     Charlie Lindgren, Karl Alzner, Daniel Audette, Nikita Jevpalovs

▼     Alex Belzile, Maxim Lamarche

Stars of the Game

1. Daniel Audette  LAV
2. Alex Belzile  LAV
3. John Quenneville  BNG

Post-game interview with Charlie Lindgren:

Post-game interview with Karl Alzner:

Post-game interview with Alexandre Grenier:

Interviews conducted by Amy J for AHL Report

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