Rocket Weekly: Lots of Goals But Few Wins
The Rocket had a bit of an offensive surge last week, scoring just shy of five goals per game on average. Unfortunately, it didn’t amount to much success as they still lost two of their three contests.
The Week That Was
Feb. 25: Toronto 4, Laval 1 – A brief return home didn’t do much to get the Rocket going. They could not muster up much in the way of offence or even scoring chances; Luke Tuch was the only one to beat Dennis Hildeby. Meanwhile, Luke Haymes, a college free agent signing last season (it’s getting close to that time of year again), picked up a hat trick to pace Toronto’s attack.
Feb. 27: Laval 9, Rochester 3 – Halfway through the third, this was a 3-3 game; no one would have predicted the offensive onslaught that came after that. Samuel Blais scored twice before the end of the second to give the Rocket the lead and then Laval poured on four more goals on eight shots in the third, chasing Devon Levi after the seventh goal of the game. Will Dineen had his first goal in a little over 10 weeks as part of that third-period attack.
Feb. 28: Laval 6, Syracuse 4 – With Kaapo Kahkonen starting to show signs of fatigue, Laval finally put Hunter Jones in for a game. It didn’t go well. While the Crunch were held to under 20 shots, they still beat Jones six times. Laval attempted a late comeback but it wasn’t enough to get it close. Syracuse is now five points behind the Rocket with three games in hand.
StatPack
Skaters:
| # | Player | GP | G | A | +/- | SOG | PIMS |
| 2 | Marc Del Gaizo | 3 | 0 | 0 | +3 | 4 | 6 |
| 4 | Tobie Bisson | 3 | 1 | 2 | +2 | 2 | 0 |
| 5 | Nathan Clurman | 3 | 0 | 0 | -4 | 3 | 0 |
| 6 | Tyler Thorpe | 3 | 0 | 1 | -1 | 5 | 0 |
| 10 | Joshua Roy | 3 | 2 | 3 | -2 | 15 | 2 |
| 15 | Sean Farrell | 3 | 0 | 2 | E | 4 | 2 |
| 17 | Alex Tuch | 3 | 1 | 1 | +1 | 5 | 0 |
| 18 | Vincent Arseneau | 2 | 1 | 0 | E | 4 | 0 |
| 19 | Samuel Blais | 3 | 3 | 2 | -2 | 8 | 18 |
| 22 | Alex Belzile | 3 | 2 | 3 | -1 | 6 | 0 |
| 26 | Will Dineen | 2 | 1 | 0 | +2 | 3 | 0 |
| 42 | Lucas Condotta | 3 | 0 | 0 | -2 | 3 | 5 |
| 44 | Josiah Didier | 3 | 0 | 0 | +2 | 5 | 2 |
| 48 | Filip Mesar | 3 | 1 | 0 | +2 | 5 | 2 |
| 49 | Jared Davidson | 3 | 0 | 0 | +1 | 7 | 2 |
| 62 | Owen Beck | 3 | 2 | 1 | +3 | 4 | 2 |
| 63 | Florian Xhekaj | 1 | 0 | 0 | -2 | 0 | 0 |
| 64 | David Reinbacher | 3 | 0 | 4 | +3 | 6 | 12 |
| 81 | Xavier Simoneau | 1 | 0 | 0 | E | 0 | 0 |
| 84 | William Trudeau | 3 | 0 | 0 | -5 | 2 | 2 |
Goalies:
| # | Player | Record | GAA | SV% | SO |
| 29 | Hunter Jones | 0-1-0 | 6.29 | .684 | 0 |
| 34 | Kaapo Kahkonen | 1-1-0 | 3.52 | .899 | 0 |
Team Leaders:
Goals: Alex Belzile (26)
Assists: Laurent Dauphin (41)
Points: Laurent Dauphin (56)
+/-: Laurent Dauphin (+26)
PIMS: Florian Xhekaj (126)
Shots: Joshua Roy (136)
News and Notes
– Adam Engstrom’s upper-body injury will keep him out for a month. It will be interesting to see how much that affects his trade value as he was likely to be one of Montreal’s more sought-after trade chips.
– While he was expected to return, Jacob Fowler’s illness kept him out for another week. Florian Xhekaj also missed the last two games due to illness while Laurent Dauphin and Xavier Simoneau were sidelined with injuries. Simoneau (upper body) is set to undergo further evaluation.
– It has been a rocky road offensively for Jared Davidson lately. He has just one assist in his last ten games and two goals and two helpers over his last 17 contests.
Last Game’s Lines:
Farrell – Belzile – Roy
Davidson – Beck – Mesar
Blais – Condotta – Thorpe
Arseneau – Dineen – Tuch
Del Gaizo – Reinbacher
Paquette-Bisson – Clurman
Trudeau – Didier
The Week Ahead
Wednesday vs Syracuse – In the back half of a home-and-home set (that started on Saturday), Laval won’t have to wait too long for a rematch. With Syracuse creeping a little closer in the standings, this game will take on a bit more importance. Through six head-to-head matchups this season, both teams have won three of them.
Friday/Saturday vs Rochester – Lots of divisional games this month. This is the third week in a row that Laval will take on the Amerks and it’s fair to say that Rochester will be motivated with how the back half of their game last week went. They will have one extra player back for this one as youngster Anton Wahlberg was sent back from Buffalo late last week. The Rocket have won four straight in the season series after losing the first two early on.
Final Thought
It’s amazing what a couple of missing players can do to Laval’s forward group. Fully healthy just a couple of weeks ago, now, they have basically just two offensive lines plus Samuel Blais trying to drag his line along. While it worked well enough last week, that’s not a forward group that’s going to score enough consistently.
Granted, getting Laurent Dauphin back will help while Florian Xhekaj fits in the bottom six. But assuming Montreal winds up with an injury or two down the stretch and potentially moves a Rocket forward or two this week, things look like they could get thinned out fairly quickly.
The Habs have five contract slots available to them at the moment. One will be for Michael Hage if they sign him after his college season ends but it looks like there should be room to pick up an extra player or two for Laval. Making at least one of those a forward would make a lot of sense.