Gabriel Balasescu scores twice as Lewiston wins its eighth straight.
By Justin Pelletier
Staff Writer

ROUYN-NORANDA, Quebec – Although they never played at the pre-renovation Central Maine Civic Center, the Lewiston Maineiacs proved on Saturday that they would have done just fine.

The Dave Keon Arena features low glass, high boards with no give, a small neutral zone and deep, nearly square corners, and that all played right into the Maineiacs’ hands.

Gabriel Balasescu and Francis Trudel scored one goal each thanks in part to two fortunate bounces off of the boards and Brandon Verge made 32 saves to lead the Maineiacs to a 3-1 win over Rouyn-Noranda, their eighth straight win and tenth in 12 games.

The win keeps Lewiston within five points of division-leading Chicoutimi and Rimouski, who both won on Saturday.

“We won and that’s the biggest thing,” Maineiacs coach Mario Durocher said. “We didn’t play well in the third period at all, though, and that is something we still need to work on.”

With the score 2-1 after the second period, Lewiston had trouble containing Rouyn-Noranda’s forwards. The speedy wingers knifed back and forth in the Maineiacs zone throughout the final frame, and after allowing just five shots on goal in the first period, Lewiston gave up 28 in the final two combined.

“Our wingers were not getting back to help out the defense,” Durocher said. “They were not involved in the play enough in the defensive zone. We tell them and tell them and tell them, but they still didn’t;t do it tonight.”

With nearly free reign of the Lewiston zone, the Huskies kept firing shots in Verge’s direction. Many of them were either blocked or missed wide open nets, and Verge did cover the puck on three or four solid chances.

Lewiston outplayed Rouyn-Noranda in the first period, dominating on the boards and through the neutral zone, but had nothing to show for it on the scoreboard.

Despite facing just five shots on goal in the opening frame, Verge had to make three quality saves, twice stopping tipped shots from the point with clutter in front. Rouyn-Noranda goaltender Mathieu Poitras, meanwhile, barely survived the 10 shots he faced.

At the end of the period, Vladisav Balaz had an opportunity in front of Poitras and scored, but the puck crossed the goal line after the horn sounded. It was the second goal waved off for Lewiston in the first, after a Balasescu tally was taken away in the first minute of the game after officials called a hand pass.

There was, however, a penalty called on the play, and on the ensuing power play to start the second period, the Maineiacs came through with a goal.

After a pass from Jonathan Paiement, Alexandre Picard shifted to the top of the right circle and shot the puck. The slap shot was tipped wide, but the rebound came off the back boards to Francis Trudel, who had rotated down to the left post. Trudel tapped the puck past a seemingly indifferent Poitras for the 1-0 lead.

Three minutes later, Balasescu took a funny bounce off the side boards in the middle of the right circle and fired a lazy slap shot toward the net. The puck floated over Poitras’ shoulder, putting the Maineiacs up by two.

“At that point we were in control of the game,” Durocher said. “We let it get away when we gave them one back.”

The Huskies struck back at 7:24 when Richard Stehlik made a bad decision and tried to flip a backhand pass across his own blue line. Benoit Fournier intercepted the lob and went in all alone on Verge, tucking the puck through the five hole to cut the deficit to one. It was the third goal scored by an opponent in two nights, and the third resulting from a bad blue-line decision.

“That has hurt us again,” Durocher said. “There was too much of a gap between the forwards and the defensemen tonight. They had all five guys in there.”

Balasescu added a shot-handed goal with 25 seconds to play to finish the scoring.

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