Men’s Hockey: Tough Times

Concordia Drops Home Opening Game 6-5 to Windsor Lancers

SportsVince Morello — Published October 17, 2015

“We had some good flashes, we have some bad flashes,” said Stingers head coach Marc-Andre Element. “If you want to compete at this level you got to play for 60 minutes and we didn’t do it today.”

“I don’t know if there was a difference, I thought both teams played and it was a good game right to the end,” said Lancers head coach Kevin Hamlin.

Although the Stingers started the game visibly energized, the Lancers struck first as Steve Anthony scored the opener against Stingers goalie Robin Billingham. Making his first start with the Stingers, Billingham let in 6 goals.

Philippe Hudon tied the game for the Stingers, however Sebastien Beauregard scored to give the Lancers a 2-1 lead.

“To be quite honest, I don’t think we played that bad,” said Stingers forward Philippe Hudon. “What really killed us were the penalties. The dumb two minute penalties really cost [us] the game because we’re a team that should be playing 5 on 5 and scoring goals.

The second period was a lot of back and forth in terms of scoring as when the Stingers would score to tie the game, the Lancers would answer back.

What could have been a turning point in the game for Concordia was lost as defenseman Youssef Kabbaj was hit from behind into the boards Blake Bondeel. Kabbaj suffered a cut above left eye and was being seen by a doctor verifying concussion symptoms.

The Stingers couldn’t capitalize on their five minute major power play after getting two consecutive penalties.

After two periods, the score was 5-3.

Early in the third period, Frederick Roy received a match penalty for a hit to the head.

“I didn’t see it. I’ll check the video,” Element said. “I was not [at the] right angle so I can’t comment on it.”

With a 6-3 score going into the last 10 minutes of the game, the Stingers rallied and scored two goals, but the comeback fell short with the final score being 6-5 in favour of the Windsor Lancers.

With a total of 18 penalties on the night for both teams combined, the coaches weren’t happy with the discipline of the game.

“I think we were a little bit more undisciplined than I would have liked,” Hamlin said.

“We can’t have that amount of penalties and if you want to win games, you got to play 5on5 hockey or on the powerplay,” Element said. “You can’t be in the box all the time.”