Louie’s Pizza and Pasta recorded their first regular
season loss Tuesday night at home, losing 6-3 to the St. George Generals. Despite losing by three goals, the team’s
level of play was not as black and white as the score would lead you to
believe.
Just seventeen seconds into the first period, Louie’s found themselves down by one goal as the Generals’ offense cut straight through to the net. While net-minder #30 Ryan Calder stopped the first shot, the usually sharp Louie’s defense left the puck within reach of another Generals’ offender who knew right what do with it.
The score remained 1-0 until 12:57 of the second period when Louie’s #19 Gage Langille, along with some help from #11 Kyle Rachar, would successfully get the puck behind the Generals’ red hot net-minder. Louie’s appeared to be on their normal high level of game, their offensive game anyway.
Throughout the second period Louie’s would continue to struggle in their own end of the ice, allowing the Generals to score three more goals in the period. After the period’s third goal, the fourth of the game, head coach Craig Robinson opted to change net-minders, putting #1 Noah Robinson in net.
While Robinson helped maintain the score at 4-1, a new problem presented itself for Louie’s; the team would now be plagued with penalties. By the end of the period, Louie’s had spent twelve minutes in the box. This was a sharp contrast to the two minutes spend there in the first.
As the buzzer sounded, Louie’s head coach Craig Robinson and his staff, trainer Scott Gould, manager Chet Langille and assistant trainer Austin Malchesky reassured and motivated the team.
As the third period got underway it looked promising for Louie’s when #2 Colin Weller-Burgess would score a solo goal at 11:57. The celebration and optimism would be cut short when, at 9:10, a string of penalties would make it necessary for Louie’s to play thirteen consecutive minutes shorthanded. To add to the team’s third period woes, #5 Riley Jayne would take an awkward fall into the boards. He would be tended by trainer Scott Gould who escorted Jayne from the ice.
Despite playing shorthanded, #7 Tyler Arts would place the puck in the stick of #17 Ryan Cooper, who, at 5:17 would put Louie’s third and final goal for the night in the net. The Generals would also score two in the third, making the final score 6-3.
Late yesterday afternoon, Robinson met with the media. He didn’t wait for questions. Like his team, two days prior, he took a strong offensive.
“That was a tough game. It was clear from the first drop of the puck that St. George came ready to play and our team did not. We got off to a slow start like in our previous two games, and it stung us on the very first play as they skated through our entire starting line and found the back of the net seventeen seconds in.
We actually had a great game in offensive zone. We cycled the puck, we made some great plays, we had sustained pressure, we just didn't find many holes in their goalie, who had a great game. In our own end it was exactly the opposite and we kept clearing a free path to our own net, which cost us.
What I really liked about our game was our penalty kill. We spent almost the entire game killing penalties. We spent the entire third period down one, sometimes two men while killing off a thirteen minute penalty, and in that time we outscored St. George 2-1. Cooper, Savoie and Arts are three talented players who seem to get stronger and stronger every game and made some dazzling passing plays around the other team's net. These three are a lot of fun to watch; then we had the likes of Gage Langille and Aaron Lonsberry, both turning on the afterburners and chasing down plays at both ends of the ice, not to mention Nick Likins who was one of our top forwards of the night, despite it being his first game on forward this year.”
It’s obvious that Robinson is proud of this team, and rightly so. He closed by saying, “Had you told me at the beginning of tryouts that our team would get to November 26th before taking its first regular season loss, I would have not believed it.”
The team has two scheduled practices before they travel to Burford on Wednesday, December 4 for an 8:15 game against the Burford Coyotes.