LEWISTON – The Quebec Major Junior Hockey League playoffs don’t begin for another month or so, but every minute of Tuesday night’s game between the Halifax Mooseheads and Lewiston Maineiacs felt like a leap forward in time.

The goaltenders were sharp, the defensemen hunkered down and limited second-chance opportunities, and the officials, for the most part, let the game flow.

“The last nine games, you want to make sure you’re peaking at the right time,” Halifax coach Cam Russell said.

And like a playoff game, offense at an opportune time was the difference.

Halifax defenseman Guillaume Monast beat Lewiston netminder Peter Delmas with a laser of a slap shot at 11:29 of the second period and Jakub Voracek snuck a slow wrister by Delmas on the power play 5:02 later to provide all the offense the Mooseheads needed in a 3-1 win over the Maineiacs in front of 2,068 at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.

“It was an even game until we got two bad turnovers,” Lewiston forward Stefan Chaput said. “We had a lot of scoring chances, but we didn’t capitalize.”

Mark Yetman, who replaced Pier-Olivier Pelletier last week and has played brilliantly for Halifax since, earned the win with 37 saves, including 13 in the third period. He allowed the one goal on a Stefan Chaput shorthanded breakaway.

“He played very good here tonight, he made some good saves,” Russell said. “He played well last game, too. Pelletier’s played a lot of hockey, and it was time to give Mark a start or two, and he’s done well.”

Not that Delmas played poorly, either. The Maineiacs’ 17-year-old turned aside 30 of the 33 shots he saw in the loss.

And just like a playoff series, the Maineiacs and Mooseheads will do it all over again tonight in the second game of a back-to-back set.

“I told the boys after the game, I said, ‘This is about as tough a playoff game as you’ll play this year, and if you play like that, you’re going to win some hockey games,'” Harding said. “I was real happy overall.”

Even the power play, despite another 0-for-8 performance, looked better.

“The puck movement was there,” Harding said. “Their goalie made some great stops, but we’ve worked hard on it all week, and it showed tonight.”

Monast’s blast from the left point came on an offensive-zone faceoff win by Brad Marchand to put the Mooseheads up 1-0, and Voracek, who also earned an assist on the Monast goal, slid his in to make it 2-0.

But going into the third period, both coaches felt that the next goal was going to determine a lot.

“You talk about momentum,” Harding said. “Any goal for gives you a momentum boost.”

“We knew we needed to not let off the gas, but at the same time, we wanted to protect the lead and not take any chances,” Russell said.

Halifax essentially put the game out of reach at 14:36 of the third when Yuri Cheremetiev, who had family from Massachusetts in the crowd, pounded home a rebound on a Tomas Knotek chance from the left circle.

Chaput made things interesting at 16:00 of the third with a shorthanded breakaway goal.

The teams square off again today at 7 p.m.