The Laval Rocket beat the Cleveland Monsters 4-2 at Place Bell on Saturday afternoon, November 7, and finished a perfect weekend against Cleveland after Friday’s 6-2 win. Laval took five of a possible six points this week, with a 5-4 overtime loss to Lehigh Valley on Wednesday as the only dropped point. David Reinbacher scored short-handed, Samuel Poulin had a goal and an assist, and Kevin Mandolese stopped 26 of 28 shots as the Rocket improved to 10-3-1 with 21 points.

How the Game Unfolded

It was a physical first period from the start. Vincent Arseneau dropped the gloves with Riley Bezeau at 2:49, and the Rocket went short-handed when Xavier Simoneau took a roughing minor at 5:02. That penalty turned into the first goal, because David Reinbacher scored short-handed at 5:34 on a play set up by Poulin and Luke Mittelstadt. Cleveland answered 31 seconds later, when Emil Andrae scored on the power play at 6:05, and Owen Sillinger put the Monsters ahead 2-1 at 10:37.

The Rocket did not let that lead stand. A Cleveland slashing penalty gave them a power play, and Poulin tied the game 2-2 at 13:32 with assists to Laurent Dauphin and Mittelstadt. The Rocket outshot Cleveland 17-12 in the period and got the better of the play once the early push from the Monsters passed.

The winner came early in the second period. At 3:44, Arseneau scored on a feed from Josh Nadeau and Reilly Walsh, and it stood up as the game-winning goal. Dillan Bentley added the insurance goal at 17:35 on a pass from Jared Davidson, a goal that made it 4-2 and gave the Rocket two goals of breathing room going into the third.

In the third period, the Rocket played the way a team with a lead should. Cleveland outshot them 9-4, but Mandolese saw all nine shots, and Cleveland pulled Gardner for the extra attacker with less than three minutes left and still could not score. A team protecting a lead wants to keep the puck to the outside, and the Rocket did that.

Special Teams and Discipline

The Rocket scored on their only power play, Poulin’s goal in the first period, and they added a short-handed goal on top of it. Cleveland got one power-play goal on six chances, so after Andrae’s goal early in the game, the Rocket killed the other five. The penalty box was busy all afternoon, with 10 infractions and 23 penalty minutes for Laval against 13 for Cleveland, including the Arseneau fight, roughing minors at the end of both the first and second periods, and six minutes for Braden Haché. That kind of game can slip away from a team that gives the other side six power plays, and the Rocket’s penalty kill is the reason it did not.

	Laval Rocket	Cleveland Monsters
Final score	4	2
Shots on goal	30	28
Shots by period	17 / 9 / 4	12 / 7 / 9
Goalie	Mandolese: 26 saves on 28 shots (.929)	Gardner: 26 saves on 30 shots (.867)
Power play	1 for 1	1 for 6
Penalty minutes	23	13

Goaltending: Mandolese Holds the Line

Kevin Mandolese faced 28 shots and stopped 26 for a .929 save percentage, and he got stronger as the game went on. He stopped 10 of 12 shots in the first period, all seven in the second and all nine in the third, when Cleveland pushed for the comeback. For Cleveland, Evan Gardner stopped 26 of 30 shots (.867), and the Rocket got four goals on 30 shots because they got to the net, took away Gardner’s sight lines and finished their chances.

Rocket Players

Nine Rocket skaters had a point. Josh Nadeau led the team with five shots on goal.

Player	G	A	PTS	SOG	+/-
Samuel Poulin	1	1	2	2	+1
Luke Mittelstadt	0	2	2	1	-1
David Reinbacher	1	0	1	2	+1
Vincent Arseneau	1	0	1	2	+1
Dillan Bentley	1	0	1	1	+1
Josh Nadeau	0	1	1	5	+1
Laurent Dauphin	0	1	1	3	0
Reilly Walsh	0	1	1	2	+1
Jared Davidson	0	1	1	0	+1

Next Up

The Rocket now have a few days off before they visit Syracuse on Wednesday, November 11. Read our recap of Friday’s 6-2 win over the same Cleveland team, Rocket Rout Monsters 6-2 as McKown Beats His Old Team.

Sources: AHL game data.