1
KITCHENER, Ont. — Justin Azevedo scored in overtime to lead the Kitchener Rangers to a 6-5 win over the Gatineau Olympiques to open the 2008 MasterCard Memorial Cup on Friday.
Azevedo wired a wrist shot high glove side on Gatineau goaltender Ryan Mior at 6:59 of the extra period for the power-play winner. The Olympiques had been called for too many men on the ice 14 seconds earlier.
Azevedo, named the Ontario Hockey League's top player in both the regular season and playoffs, also had three assists.
Matt Halischuk scored twice, Nick Spaling contributed a goal and an assists, rookie Justin Akeson and Danish NHL prospect Mikkel Boedker also scored for the host club and OHL champs in front of a full house of 6,705 at Memorial Auditorium.
Kitchener goaltender Josh Unice made 23 saves for the win.
Darryl Smith and Michael Stinziani each had a goal and two assists for the Olympiques. Paul Byron, Nicholas Valliere-Mayer and Alex Quesnel also scored for the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League champions.
The Rangers led 3-2 and 5-2 at period breaks, but the Olympiques gave chase to tie the game and force overtime in the opening game of the Canadian Hockey League championship.
Kitchener took advantage of Gatineau's porous defence below their own faceoff circles to score three unanswered goals in the first 12 minutes of the game and shell Mior with 42 shots over the first two periods.
But the Rangers went cold in the third period with just four shots on Mior, while the Olympiques picked up steam.
But Kitchener recovered its firepower in overtime and outshot Gatineau 7-0.
The Western Hockey League's Spokane Chiefs meet the OHL runner-up Belleville Bulls on Saturday (Rogers Sportsnet, 4 p.m. ET).
The team with the best record at the conclusion of the round-robin gets a bye to the final May 25 and the second- and third-place teams meet in the semifinal May 23.
Friday's game marked the first meeting between the two franchises since DeBoer's Rangers beat Groulx's Olympiques in the final of the 2003 Memorial Cup in Quebec City.
After a terrible start, Gatineau kept Kitchener from running away with it early by scoring a pair of goals in the last six minutes of the first period. The Olympiques stayed within striking distance with a power-play goal late in the second.
Claude Giroux's backhand pass against the flow of play gave Quesnel time to get a shot away from one knee and tie it at 9:05 of the third period.
Valliere-Mayer's off-speed shot skimmed past Unice's outstretched pad for a power-play goal at 2:03.
Halischuk was the overtime hero for Canada at the world junior hockey championships in January as he scored the winner against Sweden in the gold-medal game.
Azevedo, a New Jersey Devils prospect, and Spaling, a Nashville Predators draft pick, have an uncanny chemistry around the opposition's net.
Azevedo set up Halischuk's second goal of the night with a feed from behind the net at 9:29 to pad Kitchener's cushion, before Gatineau countered with a power-play goal from Smith at 12:57.
Boedker, ranked No. 11 among North American skaters by Central Scouting, blasted Azevedo's backhand pass by Mior at 2:30 of the second period for a power-play goal and a 4-2 lead.
Byron, the QMJHL's leading goal-scorer in the playoffs, banged a rebound past Unice's right pad at 16:40 of the first period to temporarily pull Gatineau within a goal.
Stinziani converted Smith's feed from behind the net into Gatineau's first goal at 14:13.
The Rangers swarmed Gatineau's net to get Mior off balance and Halischuk scored his first of the night over the prone Gatineau goalie at 11:57.
Gatineau's Joey Ryan and Kitchener's Brandon Mashinter dropped the gloves on the ensuing faceoff and fought.
Mior got a piece of Spaling's wrist shot from the high slot, but couldn't control it enough to keep it from skidding by him for Kitchener's second goal at 7:49.
Akeson scored his first goal of the post-season by winning a battle in the corner with Olympiques defenceman Mike Mallette.
Akeson came out of the corner with the puck and beat Mior with a wrist shot at 6:17.
Notes: Rangers defencemen Yannick Weber (ankle) and Robert Burtuzzo (shoulder) remained out of the Rangers lineup Friday and forward Scott Tregunna continued to fill in on the back end . . . Olympiques defenceman Mike Mallette his first game action since January when he injured his shoulder and required surgery . . . The Rangers wore retro jerseys in Friday's game with the decal of a soldier on the front. The design was taken from an English recruiting poster during the First World War. The Memorial Cup trophy has been given our since 1919 in honour of men and women who died in that war.
