Versant Ouest falls to Deux-Rives bombardement

The Versant Ouest midget AA Ouragans which includes 13 St. Laurent players suffered a crushing 7-2 defeat to the hands of a Deux-Rives Dauphins squad which dressed only 11 skaters Sunday night at Raymond-Bourque Arena.

The Ouragans rivaled with the Dauphins for shots on goal and scoring chances but were soon overwhelmed by the quantity and quality of Deux-Rives shots. Goalie Georgis Rentopoulos was often superb facing 38 shots in total.

« We didn’t respect our gameplan. As soon as they started scoring a few goals, chaos ensued on the bench. Players began to act selfish. Motivation fell for whatever reason. After that, we started making mental errors. They scored a few goals and we started yelling at each other. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to get back in the game, » said Ouragans assistant coach Charles Blom.

Things hadn’t started that bad for Versant Ouest. When Gabriel Bruno wasn’t able to score on a breakaway, Cédric Desjardins put the rebound in the net at 3:53 in the first period.

A rather weak shot from the point allowed Deux-Rives to tie the game up less than three minutes later. Philip Dupras got the tally.

The two teams exchanged quality scoring chances after that, with both squads hitting the goalpost notably.

Jonathan Quinn, with a perfect shot in the top shelf beat Rentopoulos with 21 seconds left in the first period to give the Dauphins the lead for the first time.

Ramzi Saim with a nicely-timed cross-ice saucer pass connected with Gabriel Simard who was open near the crease. Rentopoulos was taken off position and there was little he could have done on the play. At 5:26 of the second period, Deux-Rives was ahead 3-1.

The goalie can hardly be blamed for the next Deux-Rives goal either. Greg Inose cut across the slot when he spotted a hole in the top net. His backhand beat Rentopoulos who couldn’t see the play very well because of a screen in front of him.

Defenseman Ryan Oliver made the score 5-1 with a high velocity shot from the point with 3:15 left in the second period. Deux-Rives would end up winning 7-2. Dauphins head coach John Benetos told St. Laurent News how proud he was of his squad to have garnered such a decisive win with only six forwards and five defensemen in the lineup.

« The guys measured up to the challenge. They played shorter shifts, they were more disciplined. We knew we were faster than them. We wanted to take the lead early because we knew we were going to run out of steam in the third period, » he said.