Gatineau Olympiques head home with head held high after MasterCard Memorial Cup loss
KITCHENER, Tuesday, May 20, 2008 The Olympiques just couldn’t get anything going in game five of the 2008 MasterCard Memorial Cup Tournament in Kitchener and suffered a 3-1 loss at the hands of the Spokane Chiefs to finish 0-3. The Olympiques will head back to Gatineau tomorrow.
The Olympiques took a 1-0 lead after Alexandre Quesnel redirected a Maxime Mallette point-shot past Chiefs goaltender Dustin Tokarski. The goal was registered on the power-play at 15:57.
Spokane tied it up at one following Drayson Bowman’s fifth goal of the Tournament. Bowman let a shot go from the top of the face-off circle which beat goaltender Ryan Mior just above the right shoulder. Then, with just under four minutes remaining in the second period, Mitch Wahl put the Chiefs up by a goal with his first game-winner of the tournament.
Levko Koper added an empty net goal to seal the win.
"We’re obviously all disappointed, but not in the players," said Olympiques’ head coach Benoît Groulx. "The difference between our President Cup-winning playoff run and our performance at this tournament was that we just couldn’t get the key goal or the key save. There are great teams at this event. Also, I want to thank the organizing committee for taking care of us. This was truly a great experience."
Game six of the 2008 MasterCard Memorial Cup Tournament goes Wednesday between the Kitchener Rangers and the Belleville Bulls starting at 7:00 pm (ET) on Rogers Sportsnet and RDS.
