Men’s Hockey: Redmen Rout Visiting Stingers

Concordia Allows Seven Goals in Loss to McGill

SportsSafia Ahmad — Published February 6, 2016 | Updated February 6, 2016 at 8:41pm

Throughout the contest, the Stingers outshot their opponent 48 to 38 and swarmed the Redmen’s zone all night long, but the Concordia players allowed too many scoring chances and the number two-ranked Redmen capitalized.

“I guess I would say we were opportunistic tonight,” said McGill head coach Kelly Nobes. “We scored when we got our chances and won the game.”

“We were all over them,” said captain Olivier Hinse, who scored all three of Concordia’s goals. “We had control of the puck. It was way more on our side.”

“Their goals were going in and ours weren’t,” said Stingers forward Alexandros Soumakis.

On top of the missed opportunities, a disallowed goal in the first period and an overall lack of execution cost Concordia the game.

“We missed two open nets,” said Stingers head coach Marc-André Element. “And I don’t want to talk about the first goal that the ref [disallowed]. I’m gonna have to check the video again but that’s sometimes a game changer and the two open nets that we missed were game changers too.”

The referee refused a goal in the opening period for Concordia which would’ve given the Maroon and Gold a lead. Instead, a goaltending interference penalty on Stingers forward Jessyko Bernard. With the second best-ranked power-play in the Canadian Interuniversity Sport, Redmen forward Mathieu Pompei scored on goaltender Robin Billingham to take a 1-0 lead. A few minutes later, Christophe Lalonde made it 2-0 off a breakaway from his own zone.

With less than four minutes left in the first, Pompei took a hooking penalty and Stingers captain Olivier Hinse scored his first goal of the night, reducing the score to 2-1. However, it was short lived. Redmen forward Liam Heelis restored his team’s two-goal lead
before the end of the period.

After allowing three goals on 14 shots, Billingham was pulled in the second period and backup goaltender Miguel Sullivan took over. But their goaltending woes persisted throughout the game.

Sullivan would allow four more goals in the game, including two in the second period from forward Jonathan Bonneau and defenceman Samuel Labrecque. The defence’s goal set a McGill record for most goals and points recorded by a Redmen defenceman.

McGill would add two more in the third from Rock Regimbald and another from Bonneau. Concordia would only score two more goals, all from Hinse, from the beginning of the second to the end of the game.

“A hat trick is a hat trick,” said the captain, smiling. “It doesn’t happen a lot so I’m really proud of that.”

“We were a little frustrated after the first [period],” said Soumakis. “But, we were still happy with our performance because we felt we were playing well. Our goal is to work the same throughout the three periods and we did it. It’s just unfortunate that we lost.”

This was the first of a two-game series between the arch-rivals. They end their regular season next Friday in the traditional Corey Cup matchup. Both teams may face each other in the playoffs.

“[We need] to show them that were gonna be the same team that beat them twice at the end of the season,” said Redmen forward David Rose.

The Stingers are also in playoff mode.

“We have playoff hockey mentality going on right now,” says Soumakis. “If we keep working the way we are, I’m sure we’ll be ok.”

The Stingers will visit the Royal Military College Paladins this Sunday at 4 p.m.