Exhibition: Third period "Blues" do in Tommies

The Tommies were back in action on Saturday night for the first time after the long Christmas layoff, visiting les Aigles Bleu at the J. Louis Levesque Arena in Moncton.

Both teams played even over the first few minutes of the first, but then the Blue Eagles took advantage of the Tommies' tentative play and began to carry the play. Moncton outshot STU 9-1 over the first 10 minutes of the period, and opened the scoring at 9:06 as Corey Banfield lost control of the puck in front of his own net and Remi Gautreau took advantage, beating starter Matt Davis for the 1-0 Moncton lead. The Blue Eagles continued to carry the play throughout the first frame, although the Tommies caught a break in the waning moments. With Alexandre Soucy serving a too many men on the ice penalty for Moncton, new Tommie Andrew Andricopoulos drove down the left wing side, threw the puck on net, and the disc found its way behind Pier-Alexandre Marion as time expired. The teams would head to the dressing rooms tied at a goal apiece. The Blue Eagles outshot the Tommies 11-7 over the first 20 minutes of play.

The Tommies seemed to find their legs in the second period. At 1:30 of the middle stanza, Corey Banfield fed a pass from behind the net to Maxime Chamberland, whose backhand would put STU up 2-1. Moncton would extinguish the lead at 9:28, on a delayed penalty against the Tommies, Marc-Andre Bureau showed off his soft hands after a rush down the right wing, putting the puck behind Davis to even things up. Davis would then give up the crease to Ben MacFarlane, as Coach Mike Eagles' plan was to play both his goalies on this night. Just 36 seconds after Moncton's equalizer, Jeremy Turgeon beat Marion with a nice hard wrist shot to re-establish the lead for the Green and Gold. Moncton outshot the Tommies 14-11 in the second for a 25-18 lead thus far, but STU took the one goal lead into the break.

The Tommies would, however, fall back to their bad habits of the first period as the third got underway. At 5:07 Guillaume Parenteau was in position to take advantage of a short-side bounce off the back wall, and deposited the puck top shelf past MacFarlane to tie the game at 3-3. Moncton would take the lead at 10:26 after MacFarlane made the initial pad save off a Remi Doucet shot, but the big rebound went straight to the stick of Patrick Lockyer who found the back of the yawning cage for a 4-3 Blue Eagles advantage. The Tommies continued to battle, however, evening the score once again as Devan Praught was "johnny-on-the-spot" in the crease, taking advantage of a Corey Banfield rush with the tap-in to make it 4-4. But STU would not taste victory on this night, as a pair of Blue Eagles goals from Ian Girard at 12:49 and Guillaume Parenteau with his 2nd at 14:21 would put the game out of reach. The Tommies would pull back within a goal at 15:06 as Wes Welcher re-directed an Andrew Andricopoulos point shot to make it 6-5, but at 17:36, with the Tommies shorthanded, Erick Tremblay gave the puck away in the defensive zone and Remi Doucet was left alone to score the easy insurance goal. Final score 7-5 in favour of Moncton. The Blue Eagles outshot the Tommies 40-28 on the night.

Notes: Brian Soso is no longer with the Tommies. Andrew Andricopoulos impressed in his first action with STU, scoring a goal and adding two helpers. The Tommies are back in action as the regular season resumes Friday night (Jan 9th) @ St. Mary's.