The Bulldogs got shutout on home ice last night, facing the Syracuse Crunch. The Crunch, The Tampa Bay Lightning’s farm team, put two pucks past Robert Mayer and added an empty netter to earn a 3-0 win.
The first period went without a goal and was pretty evenly played; the Crunch narrowly outshot the Bulldogs by a 7-6 margin.
It was in the second period that the Crunch came alive, peppering Robert Mayer with 17 shots to the Bulldogs 7. Two of those Syracuse shots found their way into the net.
At 6:01 Dimitri Korobov scored a fluky goal to put the Crunch on the board. Korobov’s point shot came from the top of the left circle and took a few strange bounces before finding its way past Mayer.
*Note* Dimitri Korobov is one of the few Lightning players making the jump to the AHL this season (signed a two year deal with Tampa in August) after spending the past three seasons in the KHL with Minsk Dynamo. Minsk is now host to NHL’ers like Tim Stapleton, Evander Kane, Pekke Rinne, and Joe Pavelski. (Though those 4 players don’t share a position with Korobov, who is a defenseman)
Just under 10 minutes later at the 15:40 mark, former Bulldogs winger J.T. Wyman doubled the Crunch’s lead with his second of the season. Wyman played 4 season for the Bulldogs and even 3 games with the Canadiens in the 09/10 season. He was a 4th round pick in 2004 (100th overall).
Wyman was part of the Bulldogs 09/10 team coached by Guy Boucher and was picked up by Tampa, with a number of other former Bulldogs after Boucher took over as Head Coach. The list includes, Tom Pyatt, Mathieu Carle, Marc-Andre Bergeron, Benoit Pouliot, and Cedrick Desjardins (who has since returned to the Bulldogs).
The Bulldogs went into the third period with high expectations, they had come behind from a two goal deficit their past two games (winning one, and losing the other in a shootout), but last minute heroics wouldn’t be the story this time. Richard Panik would add an empty netter to clinch a 3-0 win for the Crunch. Riku Helenius turned aside all 23 Bulldogs shots to secure a shutout, while Robert Mayer turned aside 30 of the 32 shots he faced.
Brendan Gallagher was the most impressive Bulldog on the night, registering 6 of the 23 total shots the Bulldogs put on net, over 1/4!
The Dogs’ next action will come on Friday the 9th when they host Syracause for a second straight time, though this time they’ll bring the action to the Bell Centre in Montreal. If you’re in the area pick up some tickets and watch the Canadiens future stars … if the lockout ever ends.
