Rimouski Oceanic playes pile on goalie Maxime Gougeon after their 5-4 win on Sunday. (Ryan Remiorz/Canadian Press)The Rimouski Oceanic thrilled their home fans Sunday afternoon by holding off the Windsor Spitfires for a 5-4 victory at major junior hockey's Memorial Cup tournament.
Logan MacMillan scored a short-handed goal 34 seconds into the third period at the Rimouski Colisee, a goal that turned out to be the winner. Goalie Maxime Gougeon had his second strong outing of the tournament, finishing with 35 saves.
MacMillan intercepted a misguided Windsor pass in the neutral zone and was off to the races, potting his own rebound behind Windsor netminder Andrew Engelage.
"It's huge," said MacMillan, an Anaheim Ducks prospect. "If we lost this one, there wasn't much chance of us making it through.
"And it's also great for our confidence. After Game 1, the guys were kind of skeptical — that maybe we were off too long — but we bounced back great. We played really well."
Patrice Cormier, Jordan Caron, Patrick Delisle-Houde and Luca Cunti also scored for Rimouski (1-1). The Oceanic had been easily handled in Friday's opener 4-1 by Kelowna of the Western Hockey League, with Gougeon preventing a blowout with a number of big saves.
Rimouski hadn't played in three weeks prior to the tournament opener.
Late rally fails
Andrei Loktionov scored his second goal of the game midway through the third to bring the Spitfires back to within one goal, but the Ontario Hockey League champions could get no closer.
The Spitfires rallied furiously in the final minute with Engelage on the bench and twice the puck dribbled dangerously through the crease.
Oceanic defenceman Marc-André Bourdon, who finished with three assists, followed up a Gougeon save in the waning seconds by beating Windsor's Dale Mitchell to the puck as it lay on the doorstep.
"Our goalie made some awesome saves and everyone did their job," said Bourdon. "We stayed calm."
Windsor finished second in the end-of-season Canadian Hockey League rankings behind the Calgary Hitmen — who didn't make it out of the Western Hockey League playoffs — but now finds itself in an 0-2 hole at the tournament after losing an overtime game to Drummondville on Saturday.
"If you don't play your game, you're not going to win," said defenceman Ryan Ellis. "I don't think we have played our game up to now and that's how it goes.
"We're 0-2, and yeah, we'd love to be 2-0. But we've done it all year. We've faced adversity against London and other teams."
7 goals in 2nd period
Mitchell had a goal and an assist for the Spitfires, with Ellis also scoring and Taylor Hall finishing with two assists. Engelage stopped 20 shots.
The game was scoreless after one period, but the teams combined for seven goals in the middle frame.
Two power-play goals started the barrage. Cormier's tally at 3:18 was followed three minutes later by an Ellis slapper from the point.
Rimouski appeared in trouble after allowing Mitchell's short-handed tally at 8:50, but less than two minutes later Caron swept through the neutral zone and into the Windsor end, moving right to left before firing a wristshot into the top corner over Engelage.
The Oceanic regained the lead when Delisle-Houde picked up a loose puck in the slot shortly after a faceoff and fired it into the back of the net.
Big glove save
Gougeon kept it 3-2 by making a glove save on another Ellis slapshot, helping set up Rimouski's next goal.
Cunti was the beneficiary of some dazzling stickhandling by Kevin Veilleux to set up the score.
Loktionov got his first goal to make it 4-3 before the end of the second by coming out of the left corner and firing a shot over Gougeon's arm.
Each team will be off Monday, with Windsor facing a must-win against Kelowna on Tuesday.
"Kelowna's a heck of a team with a lot of offence and the only way we're going to get any life out of this tournament is that we have to throw a defensive gem at them," said Spitfires coach Bob Boughner.
Rimouski plays rival and Quebec league champs Drummondville the next night.
With files from The Associated Press
