The Xpertek Hockey News

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