This past week saw all of the teams in the Atlantic University Hockey Conference get their regular seasons started, plus hockey fans in Fredericton and Antigonish got to see both the opening of the OSHL regular season and pair of exhibition games against the visiting UQTR Patriotes. Quite a week of hockey ... well other than the OSHL product.
Wednesday saw St.F.X. visit Halifax for Dalhousie's home opener. As it was most of last season when these two teams met, captain Patrick Grandmaitre scored twice in the first period and X cruised to a 4-1 win over the Tigers. I guess the X-Men's poor record in exhibition play doesn't really mean anything.
Thursday night saw the regular season opening night of the OSHL with games at the Aitken University Centre in Fredericton and the Keating Millennium Centre in Antigonish. The Original "Stars" Hockey League might be a case for the need for truth in advertising. To quote Bruce Hallihan of The Daily Gleaner, "The 16 locked-out NHL skaters - eight aside - have combined to play 4,353 NHL games, rack up 6,691 PIM's and score 361 goals. In other words, some of them are household names only in their own homes."
There were only 500 of the $25 tickets sold in Fredericton until they discounted the price to a two-for-one deal on game day, which saw another 1500 tickets sold. Even though "headliner" Dave Andreychuk didn't make it because of travel plans nixed by the fatal plane crash in Halifax, the product on the ice at UNB wasn't worth more than a few dollars. Watching third and fourth liners, albeit over-paid NHL players, play no-contact 4-on-4 hockey with only two lines of four players was a complete yawner. No wonder they stopped playing in Ontario. I'm really glad I didn't pay for my ticket!
On Friday night we got back to real hockey, you know, the kind with intensity, physical contact and energy. UNB had their home-opener against UdeM with over 2000 fans in attendance, and les Aigles Bleus continued their saga of struggling at the Aitken University Centre. The defence completely abandoned their goaltender Pelletier, and the V-Reds managed to pot 5 goals on 11 shots in the first period. A change in the nets seemed to wake up Moncton's team defence, and the teams traded goals in the second period, with UNB getting one more in the third for a 7-1 final. Although UNB goalie Reg Bourcier wasn't strongly tested, he came up big when he had too.
Meanwhile in Charlottetown, the St. Thomas Tommies ruined UPEI's home opener with a 2-1 victory while being outshot 25-19. Both STU goals were powerplay goals, and UPEI was unable to score in the third period to tie the game up.
On Saturday the Panthers traveled to Moncton but their fortunes didn't improve. Moncton was never behind as they opened the scoring with one goal on 14 shots in the first period, and outscored UPEI two to one in the third period. The 3-1 loss leaves the improved Panthers unexpectantly 0 and 2 to start the season.
Meanwhile, back in Fredericton, the Varsity Reds were hosting UQTR. Last time these two teams met in the Aitken University Centre, les Patriotes came back from a 3-1 deficit to win 4-3 to advance to the gold medal game at the 2003 Nationals. UQTR of course went on to defeat St. F. X. for the championship, and they beat them again Friday night 3-1 in an exhibition game in Antigonish. With seven players on each team back from that game, this was guaranteed to be good grudge match, except the referee apparently had a different idea. He called 21 minor penalties in the first two periods, effectively killing any flow to the game until the third period when he eased off and only called two more penalties. UNB's Denny Johnston managed to score a short-handed goal in the second period, but there wasn't much other excitement for the 1285 fans. In the third period V-Reds veteran Troy Stonier finally found his high-tempo game this season, setti