The Road to Atlantis, or at least Atlantic Canada

A look at the weekend that was for the Drummondville Voltigeurs:

The Circus, Part II, went about as well as part I:

GOALS	1	2	3	Total
DRUMMONDVILLE	1	1	0	2
HALIFAX	2	1	3	6

Drummondville: Török scored and later assisted on Archambault's 7th of the year. M-O Brouillard had two helpers.
Halifax: Fuhgeddaboudit. Drouin makes his return to the lineup in this game and winds up with 4 points including two goals (one shorthanded), +3 and first star. Some MacKinnon guy scored two goals as well. One of my favourite names in the league (as @EP31 has had the misfortune of witnessing in person those times they played at the Verdun Auditorium), Konrad Abeltshauser, picked up two assists.

The plus side:

POWER PLAY
DRUMMONDVILLE	2 / 5
HALIFAX	2 / 6

Louis-Philip Guindon still managed 27 saves despite the loss. His counterpart, Zachary Fucale, made 16/18 stops.

Enter Graham! (Remember that guy?):

GOALS	1	2	3	Total
DRUMMONDVILLE	2	1	1	4
CAPE BRETON	1	0	0	1

POWER PLAY
DRUMMONDVILLE	1 / 3
CAPE BRETON	0 / 2

Drummondville: With the exception of M-O Brouillard, it was a J night. Jérôme Verrier! Jérémy Auger! Joey Ratelle! (First goal in the Q for the latter.) And hold on to your chairs, as the most assists category of the night was won by ...Archambault.
Cape Breton: Alexandre Lavoie was the lone goal-scorer for the Eagles.

Graham stopped all but one of 17 shots and Alex Bureau was pretty busy with 39 shots, stopping 35.

Deflate that happy-faced balloon: Just when we thought putting Graham in for the second time in 24 hours against the same team wasn't a crazy idea, Cape Breton said "And now, for a taste of your own medicine!"

GOALS	1	2	3	Total
DRUMMONDVILLE	0	1	0	1
CAPE BRETON	1	1	2	4

Womp womp.

POWER PLAY
DRUMMONDVILLE	0 / 3
CAPE BRETON	0 / 1

Drummondville: Matt Boudens gets his first of the year!
Cape Breton: Carrier, Lavoie, Malone, Woodworth. Former Voltigeur Jonathan Oligny got on the scoresheet as well with an assist (and two delay-of-game penalties), finishing +3 on the night.

Domenic Graham made 17 saves on 20 shots, while Philippe Trudeau made 15 on 16.

Friday, the Huskies are in town:
Rouyn-Noranda: 12-3-0-1, 25 points, second in the league behind the Circus, 78 GF, 53 GA, four-game winning streak, J-S Dea and Sven Andrighetto top the league with 31 points each in 16 games, Robin Gusse has a 3.07 GAA with a .887 SV%.

Drummondville: 8-8-0-0, 16 points, 10th in the league, 44 GF, 53 GA, went 1-2 on their Atlantic roadie, M-O Brouillard leads the team with 16 points in as many games followed by Archambault with 15 points, Guindon is the league's best rookie netminder at 3.10 GAA and .877 SV%. Graham has a .858 SV% and a 3.18 GAA.

Head-to-head: Split so far this season (4-2 loss, 5-4 win) with Török's hat trick the freshest memory between the two teams.

Around the league:

Apparently, Étienne Marcoux is Sugar Crisp's latest poster-boy. This reminds me of the good old Gretzky Wheaties days:



Alum-news: It was a losing weekend for most ex-Volts in the AHL, but Sean Couturier picked up assists on both goals in a losing cause against Rochester on Saturday, as well as second star. Moving back to Friday night, both Frédéric St-Denis and Gabriel Dumont scored en route to a 5-4 overtime loss against those pesky Toronto Marlies, and Jake Allen made 32 saves against the Chicago Wolves as Peoria beat them 4-1.

Olivier Fortier has found a home with the Orlando Solar Bears of the ECHL and scored what is already his third goal of the season as Greenville topped Orlando 6-5 on Sunday. Philippe Lefebvre picked up a goal in a shootout win vs. Reading on Saturday and two assists as Wheeling won 7-3 the night before against those same Royals.

In the CHL, Pier-Olivier Pelletier made 42 saves in a 6-4 win against Wichita on Friday. On the same night, he who now goes by Scotty Howes picked up two goals, both on the power play.

What other HL's am I forgetting? Ah, yes. KHL. Lokomotiv Yaroslavl's Dmitry Kulikov has 3 goals and one assist in 12 games so far this season. And since I'm already in Europe, Tomáš Svoboda has apparently been stopped in his tracks (3G, 5A in 7GP for HC Kometa Brno) with a shoulder injury that will sideline him for another month or so while fellow Czech Tomáš, Zohorna, has nine points, including four goals, in 17 games for HC Pardubice, team of the Hemskys, Krejcis et compagnie.

And it's Quebec.

'Sup Remparts?

I don't know how to approach this series. (Or the prospect of the postseason altogether, come to think of it.) I suppose the fact that Drummondville has a winning record against Quebec (3-1) in comparison to

• 0 wins all season against Victoriaville
• outscored by the Tigres 25-14 in those four games
• generally not being liked by Yanick Jean
  
  

...means we (I?) may have to thank our lucky stars that Rimouski let Victo win 4-0 this afternoon.

As imposing as both teams may seem, aside from a couple of minor hiccups, this month hasn't been a total nightmare for Drumm. Certainly finishing on the winning side of things against the division leaders has to be a plus.

That said, I'm not delving into playoff predictions this year. I don't feel like I've seen enough

action (that is the truth actually, this is the first season in seven that I have not been to a single Q regular season game) and generally I just don't like predictions, even if I wasn't terribly shabby last year (only got three winners wrong in total).

But I read something about mullets on one of the players' Twitter accounts. If that turns out to be the playoff hairdo, I may have to up my amount of vodka intake in this series. Not that it won't be stressful enough.

Update for those who cared to know: Stilts did not end up getting his 40th goal of the year, but is no less awesome. At the very least, may this playoff season send him off excellently.

Around the league: Oh, right. The other teams. Drum roll please!


Saint John faces: Cape Breton.
#TheShawi faces: Rouyn-Noranda.
Blainville-Boisbriand faces: Gatineau.
Victoriaville faces: Baie-Comeau.
Halifax faces: Moncton.
Rimouski faces: Val-D'Or.
Chicoutimi faces: Acadie-Bathurst.

Which you probably already knew before getting here, but just in case you forgot, there you go.

Injury scares seem to have a commonality in that they seem to target anyone eligible for the 2012 NHL Entry Draft. We all heard how Yakupov went down, how Galchenyuk came back only to go back down, and this weekend the bullseye landed on Marty Frk. The playoffs will reveal what shape the three players will be in, but good Lord. Start wrapping all the others in bubble wrap, pronto.

Update on the unfortunate trash can: it is safe from danger (for now) but still recovering from shock.

Alum-notes: Gabriel Dumont scored two goals against Grand Rapids Saturday night, but unfortunately, Grand Rapids scored five. He was still named second star of the game, however. Dany Massé and Olivier Fortier are still out of the lineup with injuries. Meanwhile, Freddy St-Denis has returned to the farm team cavalry after being scratched against the Isles Saturday night.

He may not be our captain anymore but he is no less fab.





Speaking of former captains, it also turns out that we have not seen the last of UQTR and that they and McGill (and UNB!) will all be participating in the CIS Championships like a fantastic 2009-and-beyond reunion. It all starts this Thursday, March 22nd, as Moncton faces McGill at 1:00 p.m. EST and UQTR battles the host-team UNB at 6:00 EST.