Jonny on the spot
Richardson finds groove with three-goal performance

Ottawa – Veteran Xpertek Construction Inc. Hockey Club winger Jon Richardson admits that he had been squeezing the stick a little too tight in the four games he had played since the birth of his first-born son.

Like most first-time, hockey-playing fathers, Richardson was eager to score that first goal so he could bring the puck home to his boy and hopefully infuse him with an early passion for the great game of hockey.

Problem is, Richardson was held pointless in every game he had played since the little tyke made his appearance – until recently, that is.

In a demonstration of pure goal-scoring precision, Richardson had not one, not two, but three pucks to bring home after Xpertek HC easily disposed of its far inferior Battlecat opponents by a 6-2 score in recent OSMHL action.

“Yeah, it’s true that I wanted to score so bad,” Richardson said post-game. “I kept the puck from my first-ever minor hockey goal. I kept the tennis ball from my first-ever road hockey goal. I kept the puck from my first-ever Carver Communications goal. I kept the puck from my first-ever Xpertek goal. And I even keep all the pucks after I score in the warm-up. Obviously, I was going to keep the puck to commemorate my first goal after my son was born. It took longer than expected, but I’m really, really, really relieved right now.”

All three Richardson goals were set up by Marc Baril, who briefly held the OSMHL scoring lead for the first time in his career, only to fall back to a tie for fifth going into this weekend’s action after other teams in the division made up their games in hand.

Xpertek HC managed the win with a back-up goaltender manning the crease in place of regular netminder Pat Lafontaine, who was called up to face the Montreal Canadiens alumni in a friendly match across town.

It remains to be seen whether Lafontaine managed to stymie the Habs shooters with the aplomb he brings to the ice in the OSMHL. Still, the call-up should be good for his confidence and will hopefully propel him to a solid second half with Xpertek HC, who will next face-off against their archrivals – The Saints – on Sunday, December 21, at 10 p.m. at Bernard Grandmaitre Arena in their last game before Christmas.


THREE STARS

1. Jon Richardson – Snipes three-goals, brings pucks home for the boy
2. Marc Baril – Makes like Gretzky, sets up three
3. Steve Parker – Two-point effort vaults centre up the league scoring ladder

Xpertek HC win streak stops at three
Surging squad manages only a tie against inferior Trash

Ottawa – It could have been reversal of fortune night at the Fred Barrett Arena Sunday evening, as team Trash almost took out the garbage that was the Xpertek HC performance, but ultimately had to settle for a 2-2 tie with the division leaders.

From the very first puck drop, Xpertek looked sluggish, often struggling to string together two passes in a row. Even when Xpertek did manage to pick up the pace, the team was ‘All-Swedish, No-Finnish’ from in close, missing on a multitude of scoring chances that could have put the game out of reach early on.

Instead, team Trash took it to the slow-to-show Xpertek HC, and even held a 2-0 lead going into the second period.

“Tabaslac, we had a lot of chances,” said defenceman Brett Kubicek after the game, trying out the French derivative of tabarnac for the first time, eager to see if he could pull it off in a sentence.

“From my perch on the blueline, I saw at least a half-dozen tabaslackan shots that could have beaten the tabaslackan goalie, but he made some tabaslackan nice saves to keep them in it,” he added, taking his usage of the more polite incarnation of the popular swearword just a little too far.

While for awhile it looked as though team Trash might walk away with the victory, most on press row knew it was only a matter of time before the sleeping giant that is the Xpertek HC offence would come to life.

Right on cue, Etienne Dutrisac – a scoring revelation early in this OSMHL season – buried a Tony Lemay rebound to cut the Trash lead to 2-1.

Later in the period, Dutrisac again factored in on the scoring when he cleverly tipped a Marc Baril face-off win back to point-man Pierre Bouwhuis, whose seeing-eye shot found its way through a maze in front to stretch the mesh in the back of the net.

With the assist, Dutrisac moved into a tie for second in league scoring behind teammate Tony Lemay.

“I’d be first if Baril and Lemay hadn’t slowed me down all night,” Dutrisac said, post-game.

Still standing high atop the division standings, Xpertek HC next takes to the ice on Wednesday, December 3, in another dreaded 11 p.m. start.

THREE STARS

1. Etienne Dutrisac -- Xpertek HC's very own Mark Streit, fills it admirably at forward
2. Pierre Bouwhuis -- Leans in hard on heavy shot to send the game to a shootout
3. Tony Lemay -- Buzzed around the net all night, unfreazable shot creates rebound for first Xpertek goal

That's hockey
Lemay nets winner in high-tempo afternoon affair

Ottawa -- If the OSMHL wants to do something about the quality of hockey played on its ice surfaces, perhaps it should schedule more Sunday afternoon matinees like the one that saw Xpertek HC do battle with Trains and Airplanes at Carleton University yesterday.

In what will go down as one of the most memorable games in Xpertek/Carver Communications history, the boys in white walked away with a hard-fought, hard-earned 2-1 victory in game that saw both teams trade chances right up until the final buzzer.

T&A opened the scoring and held onto the 1-0 lead going into the final frame. At that point, Xpertek HC's veteran experience kicked in and ultimately took over against the brash young team in black.

First, Bryan Bernard -- in his second call-up appearance of the season -- scored one of the most memorable goals in team history on a fake-and-bake dash up the middle in which he lulled the defender to sleep at the red line before setting himself up for a breakaway dangle to the top shelf.

"Been practising that move in my basement since I was a kid," Bernard said. "I'd strap on the roller-blades and motor my way around the cement floor preparing for a moment like that. The move had a little Jake the Snake Roberts to it, meaning that I put the dude right to sleep when I slowed down," he added.

Tony Lemay would score the winner later on in the period, burying a Marc Baril rebound for the go-ahead goal. The marker was a demonstration of brute strength on Lemay's part, as he was forced to carry a T&A defender on his back from the red line in.

"Sacrament, j'l'avais su l'dos depuis la ligne rouge. J'la méritais celle-là!"

After that, it was the Pat Lafontaine show, with the veteran French-Canadian netminder turning away T&A attackers at every turn. By no coincidence, Lafontaine's awesome performance came with an entire section of family watching from the stands, as the four p.m. start meant that his wife and kids could see that he really is as good of a goaltender as he says he is!

Now riding a three-game win streak, Xpertek HC next takes to the ice on Sunday, November 30, back to reality with an 11 p.m. start.


THREE STARS
1. Bryan Bernard -- Killer move makes him a spare worth calling back
2. Pat Lafontaine -- Stellar goaltending performance... again
3. Brett Kubicek -- Steady play at both ends in return from injury inspires teammates to play hard

Xpertek HC rebounds in style
Management tongue-lashing sends team on two-game win streak

Ottawa – For nearly a full period last night, it looked like Initiation Hockey on the Bob McQuarrie Recreation Centre ice surface. On no less than a dozen occasions, referees were forced to whistle plays dead because players had gone off-side.

It wasn’t pretty.

With little going in the way of momentum, it was difficult for either team to muster any offence in a low-scoring affair that Xpertek HC eventually walked away with by a 2-1 count.

“What the hell were our forwards doing,” wondered defenceman and father-to-be Pierre Bouwhuis. “It’s like they completely lost track of how to play the game. I mean, it’s not friggin’ rocket science.”

“Remind us again about off-side,” said new father and dependable winger John Richardson. “Does the player or the puck have to cross the blueline first?”

“Based on how confused we looked it might have been a better idea to scrap the rules altogether and play with pond hockey abandon instead. Jeezus!”

Despite an early inability to string together two passes in a row or enter the offensive zone with any kind of aplomb, Xpertek HC did eventually manage to open the scoring on a rare occasion where the puck went from tape-to-tape-to-tape without a whistle blown in between.

Streaking through the neutral zone with his distinctive deceptive speed, winger and non-father Adam Hendriks – fresh from a foray deep into South American badlands – dangled his way through a pair of Undead backcheckers before dishing a sweet feed over to childless centre Steve Parker just as the two entered the zone on-side.

Parker carried the puck up the right wing boards, cut towards the net, then saucered a crisp backhand pass over to power forward and three-time procreator Christian Renaud, whose deft touch around the net allowed him to score his second goal in as many games.

It was a beautiful tally that reminded those watching why the OSMHL needs to revisit its asinine one-assist policy.

“Adam started that whole play,” said soon-to-be father of three Marc Baril. “He broke out of the zone. He carried the puck up the ice. He dished it off. Yes, Childless Steve did some good work too, but that set-up in the neutral zone deserved to be recognized on the scoresheet.”

Also not appearing on the scoresheet but worth mentioning is the solid piece of puckstopping work that goaltender Pat Lafontaine put together.

On more than one occasion he was peppered from in close, but each time the ‘father-of-two, only-two, and-not-a-chance-for-more-than-two’ came up with timely saves, some of them worthy of TSN Highlight of the Night contention.

For awhile, it looked like a shutout was in the cards for Lafontaine, but the Undead managed to break the goose-egg with only 50 seconds left in the game.

Hendriks was particularly concerned that he wasn’t properly positioned on the shutout-breaking goal.

“I’ll tell you what. I just spent a week in the Costa Rican rainforest, fighting off critters of all kinds on a mission to disband an army of indigenous small arms dealers who were holding a pack of domesticated monkeys hostage… and to me, dealing with all of that was easier than trying to figure out if I needed to rush the defenceman or cover the low slot after the play got scrambly in the circle.”

“It’s a tough game, this hockey thing. I’m just glad Etienne Dutrisac’s first legitimate goal of the season stood up as the winner,” Hendriks added.


THREE STARS

1. Pat Lafontaine – Solid effort gave Xpertek the win
2. Adam Hendriks – Big first game after heroic honeymoon mission
3. Pierre Bouwhuis – A force to be reckoned with, plain and simple

Ghosts of Grandmaitre look out for Xpertek HC
Ghastly refereeing helps too

Ottawa – At first glance, the Bernard Grandmaitre Arena gives off no illusions of being haunted. But like the Montreal Forum of old, its rafters must harbour the ghostly spirits of hockey heroes past, for Xpertek HC found itself on the fortuitous end of some phantom help in a rare Tuesday night tilt for the beleaguered squad.

Coming off back-to-back losses that had team officials fuming, Xpertek needed a bounce-back performance of impressive proportions to quell the discontent that has been boiling in the management suite.

As one would expect of as talented a team as this one, the boys in white came through with a solid effort that saw them walk away with a well-earned two points in the standings, and in the process silence the naysayers that began to speak up in the wake of a two-game losing streak.

The result, however, wasn’t all attributable to good old fashioned hard work. Xpertek HC caught a couple of big breaks en route to a 4-3 victory over the Battlecats.

With the game tied at one late in the first period, Etienne Dutrisac walked in unchecked from the blueline and rifled a shot that dribbled through the goaltender but stopped just short of crossing the line.

Mysteriously, the referee blew the play dead and called it a goal.

“No doubt, la puck ‘aitait d’dans… ‘aitait d’dans, ‘aitait d’dans, ‘aitant d’dans. C’est mon premier but d’l’année pis vous allez m’dire qu’aitait pas d’dans. Boule shit. ‘Aitait d’dans,” said an agitated Dutrisac after the game before a number of teammates confirmed that in fact “la puck ‘aitait pas d’dans!”

Later on, after minor league call-up Hughes Bisson had given Xpertek the lead, the Battlecats appeared to have tied the score on a high wrist shot but once again the head referee, lagging behind perhaps because of the heavy gut that gave him the allure of an inflated zebra, erred in his judgement and failed to see that the puck had in fact gone in.

On the strength of that break, Xpertek HC managed to maintain the lead for the remainder of the game and hang on for the victory thanks to a Christian Renaud howitzer-slapshot that would stand up as the winner.


THREE STARS
1. Etienne Dutrisac -- Non-goal goal a big goal to open scoring
2. Christian Renaud -- Winning goal erases the last zero in Xpertek forwards' goal column
3. Ghosts of Grandmaitre -- Leave their invisible fingerprints on the game