LEWISTON — Real Paiement’s glare told the story.
The St. John’s coach, disgusted, shot a glare in Anthony Pototschnik’s direction. The Fog Devils’ forward had been arguing with officials, but upon seeing the stare from his coach, relented and plodded back to the locker room.
Late in the second period, with the visiting Fog Devils ahead of the Lewiston Maineiacs by a goal, Pototschnik took several strides and leveled Lewiston forward Jakub Bundil at center ice — 20 feet away from the puck. Officials handed Pototschnik a five-minute major and a game misconduct, and in the process sucked out any momentum his team may have had.
“We changed the momentum ourselves,” said Paiement. “There was no reason for the hit. It wasn’t an elbow (the penalty called on the play), it was interference, but still, it was unacceptable as we head to the playoffs.”
On the ensuing 5-on-4, Lewiston captain Marc-Andre Cliche scored the tying goal. Six minutes into the next period, he scored the winner, lifting the Maineiacs to a 4-1 win over the Fog Devils in front of 2,690 at the Colisee on Sunday.
“That killed them,” Maineiacs coach Clem Jodoin said of Pototschnik’s hit.
The win combined with a 5-1 Halifax loss to Moncton leaves the Maineiacs five points ahead of the Mooseheads for home-ice advantage in the playoffs with three games to play. Halifax has a game in hand on Lewiston, and will play tonight in P.E.I. to make that one up.
“We played with hunger, we battled and sometimes, you have to be mad to play the game,” said Jodoin. “Every shift they want to fight. Let’s play hockey, but it doesn’t mean we have to back up, either. I would like to finish, I would like to play my kids more toward the end of the season and rest the veterans and avoid injury. We’re almost there now.”
Lewiston dominated territorially early on, but Nicolas Bachand put the Fog Devils ahead 1-0 with a rebound goal at the right post.
The goal came after Lewiston’s inability to score on a 5-on-3, and the Maineiacs failed two more times in the opening period with an extra skater.
“We had chances,” said Jodoin. “We had the chances. (Brandon) Verge made some great saves for them.”
Verge, the former Maineiacs’ netminder, stopped 38 of the 41 shots he faced in his final appearance in Lewiston.
“He was amazing to keep us in the game and he shouldn’t have had to be,” said Paiement.
The Fog Devils had their own 5-on-3 midway through the the middle period. Brandon Roach retaliated after being cross-checked and was assessed a minor and a 10-minute misconduct penalty. In protest, Jodoin stood in the doorway of the players’ bench, trying to gain referee Pascal St. Jacques’ attention. He never did. Play continued after a faceoff for 16 seconds before St. Jacques blew the whistle and gave Jodoin a bench minor. The Fog Devils never capitalized on the 5-on-3, though.
The Maineiacs nearly squandered all of the power play time thanks to the Pototschnik hit, but Cliche’s 34th goal of the season on a tip-in at 19:38 lifted Lewiston back into a tie.
Cliche added another from a tight angle at 6:50 of the final frame to make it 2-1, and in one of Verge’s rare mistakes, Chris Tutalo squeezed a shot between the netminder’s arm and body at 14:49 to put Lewiston ahead 3-1.
Michal Korenko added an empty-netter at 19:58, which also gave newcomer David Taylor an assist in his first game with the Maineiacs.
Lewiston hosts Drummondville on Wednesday and Saint John on Friday before finishing the season at Saint John on Sunday.
NOTES – St. John’s forward Marty Doyle, as expected, sat out of Sunday’s game due to a suspension. Also missing for the Fog Devils were Zack Firlotte and Matt Boland…Maxime Mathieu is expected back Wednesday. The Maineiacs’ forward has been out with a concussion.
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