What a difference a day makes.

One night after playing a sloppy defensive game and escaping Baie-Comeau with a 5-2 victory, the Lewiston Maineiacs rolled into Chicoutimi on Saturday and played what coach Clem Jodoin called a “great defensive game” – and lost.

Stanislav Lascek had a goal and an assist and Marek Zagrapan and David Desharnais had two assists each as the Sagueneens rolled over the Maineiacs 3-0 at the Centre Georges-Vezina in front of an announced crowd of 2,300.

“The funny thing is, if you can believe it, we played better defensively (Saturday),” said Jodoin. “It is hard to understand, I know. We played better defensively and couldn’t put the puck in the net.”

And the netminder recording the shutout was all too familiar to the visiting team.

Brandon Verge, traded to Chicoutimi during training camp, stopped 23 shots for the shutout.

“No doubt he made some good saves,” said Jodoin. “We had a hard time passing the puck in the offensive zone, but he came up with some good saves when he had to.”

Also hampering Lewiston’s efforts was a lack of faceoff wins. In 68 chances, the Maineiacs won 30 faceoffs, an efficiency rate of 44.1 percent.

“We were chasing people all night after the faceoff,” said Jodoin. “It didn’t seem like we won any at all for a while.”

Chicoutimi scored a power-play goal at 11:45 of the first period when Lascek slid the puck past Jaroslav Halak (20 saves), and added to it four minutes later on a Shayne Tremblay tally.

In the second, Lewiston fell behind 3-0 when Maxime Boisclair netted his 13th goal of the season, again on the power play.

The Maineiacs led the teams in scoring chances in the third period, but could not solve Verge, who came away with his third win of the season against three losses and two ties.

Lewiston returns to the ice this afternoon at 4 p.m. when it faces off against Shawinigan, which defeated Quebec 4-3 in overtime Friday night.