HALIFAX, Nova Scotia – The Lewiston Maineiacs allowed 55 shots against in Game 4, more than double the number of shots they allowed in Games 1 and 2 combined (52).

While it isn’t unprecedented for a team to manage 55 shots on goal (Vancouver’s Roberto Luongo faced 76 in a four-overtime NHL game this week), that total is unprecedented in the Clement Jodoin era.

In three full regular seasons and three different playoffs, Jodoin’s teams had never allowed 55 shots on goal. In all, the Maineiacs have allowed more than 50 shots to reach a goaltender just four times since Jodoin took over.

“We have to play better in the defensive zone, give better coverage,” Maineiacs’ defenseman Chad Denny said.

The 55 shots against marked just the second time this season the Maineiacs have allowed more than 40 shots, with a 6-4 loss to St. John’s in January.

Halifax passed that threshold by the three-minute mark of the third period.

In the 2004-05 regular season, Jodoin’s first season at the helm, Lewiston allowed more than 40 shots 10 times – nine times on the road. The high that year was 52 shots against in a game in Rimouski at the end of that season, a 7-1 loss.

Rimouski eclipsed the 40-shot plateau twice more against Lewiston in that year’s playoffs, including a 53-shot outing in Game 4.

The following year, Lewiston cut the number of games it allowed 40 shots to seven, with five of those coming on the road.

The Maineiacs still managed to win four of those seven games. In the playoffs last year, also in Game 4 against Halifax, the Maineiacs allowed the Mooseheads 47 shots in a loss.

Sharing the load

Both teams in this quarterfinal matchup have used a variety of players to get the job done rather than working with just one line. That depth, which Halifax had failed to use in the first two games, was apparent in Game 4, when Ryan Hillier scored his first of the series.

In all, 11 Mooseheads have at least one point against Lewiston in these playoffs.

Not to be outdone, however, Lewiston has 13 different skaters with at least a point, including team captain Marc-Andre Cliche, who leads the team with seven points in four games. Cliche also leads the team in total playoff points with 12 in eight games.

Pow, right in the kisser

As the team gathered before Thursday’s practice, they again circled up to play volleyball in the cavernous hallway at the Halifax Metro Centre. This time, they allowed play-by-play radio announcer Jeff Mannix to join in the fun.

On the first set, three players went after a ball that another player had popped high into the air.

Jakub Bundil, the tallest player on the team, jumped into the air and welcomed Mannix to the game by spiking the ball off the bridge of Mannix’s nose, sending him reeling.

Even though Mannix was down for the count for a few seconds, the ball remained in play as it then popped back into the air and was subsequently ricocheted off of Pierre-Luc Faubert’s shin pad, sending the 20-year-old to the sidelines early.

Perhaps feeling pity, none of the players again tried to victimize Mannix, and he made it to the final, where he lost to Triston Manson.

New digs

Both the Maineiacs and the Mooseheads had to pack up and head out of the Halifax Metro Centre on Thursday to practice at the Halifax Civic Centre, an annex of the Halifax Forum, site of last year’s playoff games in Halifax.

Thanks to a scheduling conflict (a Jann Arden/Gordon Lightfoot concert), the ice at the Metro Centre was unavailable for practice Thursday.


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