Coming off a massive victory against one of the best teams in the AHL, the Providence Bruins, the Laval Rocket went into Friday’s road game against the 10-11-2 Belleville Senators rolling. The first game of a back-to-back, Laval looked to set the tone for Saturday against a Senators team they’d beaten thrice already this season.
With Adam Engström and Florian Xhekaj being returned by the Canadiens on December 3, the lines saw a significant shift. The first forward line stayed, but Sammy Blais and Xhekaj replaced Owen Beck and Filip Mešár. Beck joined Lucas Condotta and Xavier Simoneau on the third line, and Mešár was relegated to the fourth trio with Luke Tuch and Will Dineen. Defensively, Engström slotted next to William Trudeau on the top pairing, pushing David Reinbacher down to the second with Tobie Bisson. Jacob Fowler got the start, his 14th of the season.
As things got going in a seemingly mostly empty CAA Arena, there also looked to be an unbelievable amount of open ice available. The Rocket allowed Belleville some strong offensive-zone shifts, but looked deadly on the counter-attack early on. Xhekaj was stoned on a two-on-one opportunity less than two minutes in, but it seemed like a sign that the new second line was going to be the one to watch.
After a few minutes of scrappy neutral-zone play, Laurent Dauphin woke the Rocket up with a great breakaway opportunity that was stopped by Senators goalie Mads Søgaard. Laval scored on the ensuing faceoff, with the two returnees combining for a goal.
The goal put some fuel in the Rocket’s thrusters, and that forced Belleville into a tripping call just seconds later, putting them on the power play. The power play generated a couple of chances, but Laval was unable to push anything through Søgaard.
The Rocket continued to dominate the physical and possession game, outshooting the Senators significantly through the stretch of the period. It felt like every bounce was going in Laval’s favour, with the Rocket creating multiple odd-man rushes from freak bounces in the neutral zone.
The second line doubled the lead with just under five minutes to go in the opening frame, with Blais capitalizing on another neutral-zone turnover, setting up Joshua Roy for his sixth of the year.
Laval took its two-goal lead into the intermission, having outshot the Senators 14-7 in the frame.
The third line opened the second period with a solid shift. Beck, who was held pointless in his last three (but with 13 shots) got a chance right away, but Simoneau got caught up with Søgaard while trying to wrap around the rebound. Laval’s puck retrieval was a dominant force in the first half of the second period, helping the team win every battle and every loose puck.
The game went back and forth until Belleville got a huge chance six-and-a-half minutes in that resulted in Fowler being bowled over, which is becoming a bit of a theme.
Will Dineen was charged with a slashing penalty on the play, but the Rocked killed off the penalty and immediately got back to work offensively, testing Søgaard a couple of times from the point before Belleville’s Lassi Thomson took an interference penalty.
Laval couldn’t convert on the man-advantage, and Belleville took advantage, scoring less than a minute after the penalty’s expiration.
William Trudeau took an interference penalty minutes later, sending Belleville on a late-period power play. The Senators used that opportunity to score for a second time, tying the game in just four minutes on a pair of lax defensive plays from the Rocket.
Now looking at a tied scoreboard after almost 30 minutes of domination, Laval needed a positive heading into the second intermission. It almost happened, with Søgaard stoning Alex Belzile with just eight seconds left.
After the intermission, with Laval outshooting Belleville 26-16 in a 2-2 tie, the Rocket needed a spark after the disastrous end to the second period.
Laval looked a little flat off the opening faceoff. Carter Yakemchuck, who’d been dangerous all night, got a quick chance just 30 seconds in, but Fowler came up big, stopping a goal that would have set the tone for the period. Belleville controlled the pace of play for the opening five minutes, keeping the Rocket on their heels and forcing Fowler to be sharp in the face of dangerous chances.
Laval struggled to get clean defensive-zone exits and only managed a few scrambling low-danger rush chances during the Senators’ onslaught, but the Rocket were effectively limiting chances under the Belleville offensive cycle.
Laval, which hadn’t had any consistent offensive-zone control since the opening half of the second, continued to battle, but had only managed a single shot in almost seven minutes of third-period play. When Laval finally did get some o-zone time midway through the third, it looked disjointed and sloppy.
Luck was still on the side of the visitors, however. It looked like Laurent Dauphin was trying to throw the puck behind the net, but the pass banked off the side of the cage and right to a primed Belzile., who made no mistake for his ninth of the year.
The goal finally seemed to fuel a game that was clearly matching the nonexistent Friday-night energy in Belleville, with both teams turning up the physicality and scrums beginning to break out post-whistle. The benches began chirping, and Belleville’s bench was called for unsportsmanlike conduct, giving Laval a massive opportunity on the man advantage with 10 minutes left in regulation.
Belleville dominated Laval on the penalty kill, improving to three-for-three on the day, and then drew a penalty of its own minutes later after an interference call against Marc Del Gaizo. The Senators, who already had a goal on the man advantage, looked dangerous, but Josiah Didier single-handedly shut down three huge opportunities.
With the final minutes winding down, both teams looked disjointed, and neither squad was putting together anything of danger. Eventually, Florian Xhekaj was able to seal the game with an empty-net goal. It was his fourth goal of the year and third point of the night.
Sean Farrell would pot another empty-netter, making it a 5-2 final.
Final Score: Laval 5, Belleville 2
Laval (16-6-0) will try to keep the good times rolling on Saturday as they try to stifle the Senators in their home rink once again. Expect Kaapo Kähkönen to get the start given the back-to-back situation.