Eagles continue to soar
Newcombe records hat trick as Cape Breton takes series stranglehold
CHICOUTIMI, QUE. — The Cape Breton Eagles inched one step closer to advancing to the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League semifinal series on Tuesday night.
Jacob Newcombe scored three times, becoming the first Eagle to record a hat trick in a period in a playoff game in team history, to help lead the Eagles to a 6-2 win over the Chicoutimi Saguenéens in Game 3 of the best-of-seven series at Centre Georges-Vézina in Chicoutimi.
With the win, the Eagles take a stranglehold of the series leading 3-0 with Game 4 set for Wednesday night in Chicoutimi. The result was not available at publication time.
Charles-Antoine Lavallée, Émile Ricard and Olivier Houde also found the back of the net for the Eagles, who have won 16 of their last 17 games dating back to the regular season.
Former Eagle Thomas Desruisseaux as well as Jacob Lafontaine netted goals for the Saguenéens in front of 3,860 fans.
Cape Breton’s Nicolas Ruccia made 26 saves. Chicoutimi’s Rémi Delafontaine stopped 10 of 14 shots before being replaced by Raphaël Précourt, who turned aside 15 of 17 shots in his 33:20 of relief.
Ruccia, who in the series set an Eagles franchise record for longest time without allowing a goal in the playoffs, had his shutout streak broke at 167:27 with Desruisseaux’s goal.
The Eagles opened the scoring early in the first period with Lavallée tapping home his third of the playoffs at 4:58 before Ricard added to the lead with his first career QMJHL playoff goal from the blueline at 9:24 of the opening frame.
Cape Breton continued its offensive dominance with Newcombe notching his fourth of the playoffs at 1:33 of the second period, which was followed by Houde’s fourth of the postseason at 6:40 to give the Eagles a 4-0 lead.
Newcombe made the score 5-0 with a power play marker just over two minutes later before Desruisseaux’s power-play goal put the Saguenéens on the board for the first time in the series.
The Eagles took a 6-1 lead into the third period with Newcombe completing the hat trick late in the second period on the power play. Lafontaine would score the lone goal in the third period for Chicoutimi.
Cape Breton outshot Chicoutimi 31-28 while going 2-for-4 on the power play. The Saguenéens were 1-for-6 with the man-advantage.
A recap of Game 4 is available online at saltwire.com/ cape-breton/. It will also be available in Friday’s print edition.
NOTES: Jude Campbell (healthy), Noah Larochelle (healthy) and Cam MacDonald (illness) were out of the lineup for Cape Breton; Loïc Usereau (illness), Jérémy D’Astous (healthy) and Marek Beaudoin (healthy) were scratched for Chicoutimi.