SUBWAY GAME RECAP: Sea Dogs Season Comes to an End in Game 5
The Sea Dogs 2022-2023 season came to an end on home ice at TD Station tonight against the number 1 ranked team in Canada, the Gatineau Olympiques. The Sea Dogs had a very hard-fought series against the Olympiques, leaving everything on the ice.
Tristan Luneau had a goal and two assists to lead the Gatineau Olympiques over the Saint John Sea Dogs, taking game 5 6-1 and the West Division QMJHL quarter-final series 4-1.
Francesco Lapenna made 30 saves to get the series-clinching win for Gatineau.
Eriks Mateiko had the lone goal for the Sea Dogs while Ventsislav Shingarov made 43 saves in the Saint John net.
Gatineau had the first dangerous chance of the game just over a minute in as Luneau fed a cross-crease backdoor pass to a wide-open Cam Macdonald, but MacDonald fanned on the shot.
Two and a half minutes later, Vincent Maisonneauve walked in from the point and fired a wrist shot top corner past Shingarov to give Gatineau the early 1-0 lead.
Mateiko nearly tied the game seconds later, pouncing on a rebound amidst a scramble in front of the Olympiques net but Lepanna got across to make the save.
Olivier Nadeau answered with a chance a minute later, intercepting a Sea Dogs clearing attempt to break in 1-on-1 with Shingarov, but the Saint John netminder kicked it out with his right pad.
Gatineau built more momentum with the game’s first powerplay where they showed great puck control that led to a pair of great chances. One was a hard point shot from Luneau which Shingarov stopped and denied Nadeau on the rebound. The other was a point shot from Riley Kidney which Shingarov snagged with his glove.
Then the Sea Dogs came inches away from a short-handed goal as Pavel Simek intercepted a pass for a breakaway down the right wing, but Lapenna stayed with him and made the stop.
Shots after the first were 17-6 for the Olympiques.
Gatineau added to their lead 2:12 into the second as Kidney skated up the left wing into the Sea Dogs zone and dropped the puck to Luneau who snapped a shot past the glove of Shingarov to make it 2-0.
The Olympiques dominated play for the rest of the first half of the second until the Sea Dogs found life as Alexis Cournoyer skated the puck in and dropped it to Mateiko who fired a shot over the left shoulder of Lapenna to cut the lead to 2-1.
Gatineau got the goal back just 40 seconds later with MacDonald driving to the net and putting a backhander under the right arm of Shingarov to make it 3-1.
The Olympiques struck again four minutes later as a shot from Alexis Gendron created a mad scramble for the puck that ended with Nadeau putting the puck past a sprawling Shingarov and just over the goal line to make it 4-1 after 40 minutes.
Shots after the second were 35-15 for Gatineau.
The Olympiques put the game out of the Sea Dogs’ reach early in the third, winning a clean offensive zone draw, cycling the puck down to Samuel Savoie who walked out from behind the net and buried the 5-1 goal past Shingarov.
Zachary Dean scored an empty-netter with 1:39 remaining to make it a 6-1 final.
Final shots were 49-31 for the Olympiques.
Alpine 3 Stars
1 Charlie DesRoches
2 Brady Burns
3 Alex Drover
Gatineau will now wait for the rest of the first-round series to play out to determine their next opponent.
