Tag: gee gees

Categories
Sports

Concordia Stingers’ men’s hockey team dominates Ottawa Gee-Gees 4-1

Concordia Stingers vs. Ottawa Gee-Gees at the Ed Meagher Arena on Feb. 3, 2023. Maria Bouabdo/ The Concordian

Stingers’ forward Maxim Trépanier’s hat trick helps Concordia get an important win for the upcoming playoffs

Last Friday night, the Concordia Stingers’ men’s hockey team stunned the Ottawa Gee-Gees by scoring four unanswered goals in the third period at the Ed Meagher Arena, thereby securing the second spot in the OUA East.

The Stingers and the Gee-Gees followed each other closely during the first period. The tension was high, but neither team could capitalize on their respective power plays. The first period ended with 11 unsuccessful shots for Concordia and eight for Ottawa.

Only in the second period was Gee-Gees’ forward Anthony Poulin able to score the first goal of the game against Stingers’ goaltender Jonathan Lemieux. Concordia, however, still couldn’t get on the board by the end of the period, with a total of 26 shots over 40 minutes.

The Stingers made crucial changes to their gameplay in the third period, allowing them to take the lead over the Gee-Gees.

“I told the guys to be honest with their performance and to step up their game and they did it,” said Stingers’ head coach Marc-André Elément. “We looked at some videos and the guys were playing on the outside, they weren’t staying in front of the goaltender. In the third period we went in there and that’s how we scored some goals.”

And score goals, they did.

Four minutes into the third period, Stingers’ forward Maxim Trépanier scored a first goal and tied the game after receiving a pass from Stinger’s defender Simon Lavigne and sliding it past Gee-Gees’ goaltender Christian Sbaraglia. He scored again three minutes later, giving Concordia the lead. This time centre Tyler Hylland and defender Sean Larochelle got the assists.

A few minutes later, Stingers’ centre and captain Phélix Martineau scored and furthered Concordia’s lead with help from Stingers’ right-winger Charles Tremblay and left-winger Isiah Campbell.

Two minutes before the end of the game, Trépanier received valuable passes from Lemieux and Stingers’ defender Kyle Havlena and took one final shot at an empty Gee-Gees’ net, setting the final mark of 4-1. It marked Trépanier’s second hat trick in two consecutive games and Lemieux’s second assist as a goaltender.

“It’s teamwork, it’s my job to start the game and the guys take care of the rest,” said Lemieux. “In an empty net situation, we have more chances to [score], but to do it for the hat trick of a teammate is really fun.”

Trépanier mentioned that the positive attitude in the locker room during the second intermission helped the team get the win.

“We knew after the first two periods that we weren’t playing our best game, but I think that we really stepped it up in the third period,” said Lemieux.

The goaltender also added that his teammates made his job much easier, allowing him to face only six shots in the last period.  

Despite the big win, the team remains focused on the important games ahead.

“We still have work to do this week for the playoffs, but we are getting close to where we want [our performance] to be,” said Trépanier.

Friday’s win guaranteed a first-round playoff bye for the Stingers, and their Saturday 3-2 victory against the Carleton Ravens marked their fifth consecutive win.

The Stingers’ last regular season game will be disputed at home on Feb. 10 against the Queen’s Gaels.

Categories
Sports

Ottawa 3, Concordia 1: Penalties kill the Stingers against the Gee-Gees

I just want to start off by rescinding a take I made on Twitter before Sunday’s game between the Concordia Stingers women’s hockey team and the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees. 

The last time I saw Ottawa play Concordia was a 6-2 Stingers win in early January. On Sunday, I went on Twitter and commented on how Ottawa (currently the #3 seed in the RSEQ) would be a better match-up for the Stingers than Montreal or McGill.

I’d like to take that back now.

The Stingers took six penalties and just seemed to be a step behind all game against the Gee-Gees. To Ottawa’s much deserved credit, they did everything that the Stingers usually do so well. They got shots off in dangerous areas, disrupted the Stingers zone entries, and drew penalties when it mattered.

The Gee-Gees (21 points) are now riding a five-game win streak and moved past Montreal (20 points) in the standings.  They look like a team with a purpose. They move the puck extremely well, play with speed and work their special teams with efficiency. This is a dangerous team. With two games left in their season, they could technically even pass McGill (24 points) for second place.

Ottawa clearly had fresher legs after their Friday game against the Carabins was cancelled due to weather. Stingers head coach Julie Chu wasn’t making any excuses though.

“I don’t know if it was fatigue,” said Chu after the game. “I didn’t like the jump at the beginning of the second period. We just took penalties…We took six penalties, and they were all deserved. For a team that’s really good like Ottawa, they got good goaltending, they work hard, they can put pucks away.”

Stingers captain Claudia Dubois picked up her third goal of the weekend on a power play goal early in the first period. She’s up to 12 on the year now. After that, Ottawa controlled most of the pace.

“We had our power play opportunities in the first, we scored one which was good,” said Chu. “The key is in the second we had two breakaways, a pretty good rush and another backdoor play. I’d say four really good scoring chances. We have to put one or two of those away.”

Alice Philbert made the saves she could, but Ottawa hammered away around the net. Despite being outshot by the Stingers 30-22, the Gee-Gees looked like the more dangerous team. Sophie Gareau, Christine Deaudelin, and Melina Roy were Ottawa’s goal scorers.

The Stingers only have one game left in the regular season, a Valentine’s Day match against the last-placed Carleton Ravens. Even with playoffs looming, Chu isn’t looking past the regular season quite yet.

“We have our eyes set to do everything possible to make sure our team is feeling good and playing great hockey,” said Chu. “We have a big game against Carleton, and we’ll shift our focus after that […] That’s been one of our keys this year is that we haven’t been looking way down the road. We haven’t been talking about RSEQ championships, or nationals, or playoffs. We’ve been taking it one game at a time, and today was a big part of that.”

NOTES:

  • The RSEQ is in a blender. If I’m Julie Chu and the Stingers, there’s no clear advantage to any of the potential matchups. Ottawa is getting hot at the right time. Montreal is a tough, experienced squad with a proven track record, McGill is relentless on the forecheck. Every series is going to be a marathon, and I can’t wait to see what happens.

Feature photo by Britanny Clarke

Categories
Sports

Ravens 4, Stingers 3 OT: Stingers battle back but fall short in OT for second game in a row

Last week the Stingers beat the Ottawa Gee Gees 8-7 in overtime.

The Stingers looked to have turned a corner but in the three games following that win, they have gone winless, with a 0-1-2 record in that stretch.

“It’s two big points. It’s not an easy weekend,” said head coach Marc-André Élément. “It’s not an easy weekend, we gotta work on some things but overall I’m happy about the way we played this weekend.”

Whenever Concordia faces Carleton, things get chippy — fast. Last night’s game was no exception to that rule.

Everyone knows about the rivalry with McGill which comes naturally as they are the Stingers’ crosstown rival. Those games always make for high intensity, fast paced hockey.

The one with Carleton is just different. These games always contain some form of controversy. In this edition, the controversy came in the third period when Chase Harwell made a seemingly clean hit but was given a five minute penalty and an ejection for a slew-foot.

On the ensuing powerplay, Carleton took full advantage and notched a goal off the stick of Alexandre Boivin. Exactly six seconds after the penalty was over, Boivin scored again

About two minutes after that, the Ravens’ Cody Caron took a double minor for high sticking. Right off the faceoff win by Félix Lauzon, Bradley Lalonde one timed a puck past Mark Grametbauer, the netminder for the Ravens. A minute and 50 seconds later, Liam Murphy streaked down the right wing side and fired home the tying goal.

Before their match with Carleton, the Stingers’ hadn’t scored a powerplay goal since they played RMC on Nov. 23. They scored all three of their goals last night with the man advantage. Captain Philippe Sanche scored the first goal of the game — his first goal since Oct. 12.

“I think that was my hardest shot ever,” Sanche laughed. “I was so angry at myself for not scoring goals on so many chances in the last few games. It was a great play from all five guys on the ice.”  The players were in a light mood after, not dwelling on their losing streak. But the fact remains that they will need to start winning games if they want to be taken seriously in the playoff conversation.

“We gotta score more goals. When we have the chance we have to put it in,” said Élément. “We have to be hungrier around the net.”

The Stingers will resume play on Jan. 18 when they take on the Nippissing Lakers, a team they have yet to face this season, at home. Puck drop is set for 7:30 p.m. at the Ed Meagher Arena.

 

Feature photo by Cecilia Piga

Exit mobile version