Tuesday July 2
(5)GK vs Black Knights (3)
Depleted Black Knights battle till the end in close loss to GK
Nearly every aspect of their game prompted the Black knights to have a chance against a deep and structured opponent expect for one, and that was the penalty kill. Throughout most of the match, the Black Knights did the smart thing of avoiding the penalty box, but that was up until the latter stages of the game. T.Phan responded in the third period tying the game for the GK. Then, minutes later, the Black Knights found themselves down two men which can only cause can recipe for disaster against the GK. As most would expect, somebody would eventually come through to snap the tie. M.David was that player collecting his second point leaving six minutes on the clock. Unfortunately for the Black Knights, they just didn't have enough in them to equalise the score. Capping off the night was P.Genereaux on an empty net marker. GK relied on balanced scoring that saw five different players find the back of the net. Both sides made some adjustments improving their roster. The GK will look to S.Lachapelle and T.Lord for some more depth while K.Duplin ,A.St-Denis and P.Cherry all played for a first time as well for the Black Knights.
(2)Punishers vs River Rats(1)
C.Stavriadis shines as Punishers edge out River Rats
The Punishers goaltender turned away several good chances while making plenty of key saves in a close 2-1 win over the River Rats. The Punishers wasted no time getting to P-O Girouard, who couldn't deny C.Gingras. They did however respond by the mid way point of the contest courtesy of M.Cerone. For how close both sides were playing each other, the next goal proved to be valuable. It took only four minutes after Cerone tied it for A.Kakivelis to strike and regain the lead for the Punishers. Still, time wasn't an issue with plenty of it left over. But for how sound the Punishers were defending and with Stavriadis remaining focused, the River Rats kept feeling the frustrations in their inability to level.
The SalumiVino player of the night goes to Costa Stavriadis of the Punishers. Expect for one time, the River Rats didn't seem to have much of a solution on how to solve Stavriadis. Clearly, net minding proved to be the difference in this heated battle between the two sides.
Follow Hockeyballe.com on these social networks