London Knights’ early goalie pull in Memorial Cup loss had unintended consequence

LONDON, Ont. — Dale Hunter's priority on pulling his goalie early might have run smack into into the no-change-after-an-icing rule that is used at the Memorial Cup, but not during the Ontario Hockey League season.

Those two elements came into curious conflict, at least to those among us who will one day retire undefeated from our armchair coaching careers, during the final two minutes of the Val-d'Or Foreurs' 1-0 squeaker over the host London Knights at the Budweiser Gardens. With 1:56 left, the Foreurs, roughly 72 hours removed from playing Game 7 of the Quebec League final 1,400 km away (that's all?) in Baie-Comeau, looked weary after icing the puck to end a long London encampment in their zone. Captain Samuel Henley, wings Louick Marcotte and Anthony Mantha and defencemen Randy Gazzola and Ryan Graves couldn't be replaced. Hunter called timeout to set up the 6-on-5 situation.

In an OHL game, the opposing coach would be able to send out a fresh five. By the numbers, pulling the goalie with almost two minutes to go is the right call. It happened to have an unintended consequence.

"It gives you more opportunity to score," Hunter said. "You see more and more teams do it."

"We had to be organized for what we wanted to do with pulling the goalie," the Knights coach added in explaining the decision to use his timeout, even though it meant giving the Foreurs a chance to catch their breath.

'Know the tricks'

With some big help from Bibeau, the Toronto Maple Leafs pick whose 51 saves were the most in a Memorial Cup game since 2008, the famished five got through another 56 seconds of game action, icing the puck twice. Bibeau scooped up a shot to force a faceoff with exactly 60 seconds left to let Val-d'Or get a change after what worked out to almost a 100-second shift.

"Obviously our legs were burning a little bit, but no more than you could take," said Graves, a New York Rangers fourth-round pick whom Val-d'Or acquired at Christmastime from Charlottetown when it decided to fortify its defence and goaltending in a bid for a Memorial Cup run. "Playing tired is nothing new for us. We're used to it. So we were right to have not called timeout there. He [Durocher] saved it in case we needed it later."

Mantha added that the Foreurs are well-drilled in these run-out-the-clock situations. They faced their share during successive seven-game marathons in the final two stages of the President's Cup playoffs, where they won Game 7 on the road against both Halifax and Baie-Comeau.

"With not changing after the two icings, we're used to that in the Q," said Mantha, who got the only goal with 3:40 left in the first period after stealing the puck inside his own blueline and working a give-and-go with Henley. "We know the tricks you can use to rest. We're in great shape right now so we get to used it.

You take your time to come back for the faceoff — five seconds, 10 seconds can make the difference. You get a little rest when the puck is going down for the icing."

Microcosm for both teams' path

The end might not have pretty, but it epitomized how Val-d'Or has rolled with the punches while making its way to playing in mid-May. Bibeau being required to make 20 first-period saves, as he did Friday, is hardly novel.

"We're used to getting outshot in the first, that's kind of how it's been all year," Graves said. "With Bibs, that's how he's been all year."

London had 51 shots on net and probably at least that many that went over the net. Sunday's game vs. Edmonton will be a better proof of how the Knights rate with the three league champs. London had five weeks off after its five-game second-round loss to the eventual OHL champion Guelph Storm. (Guelph and Edmonton play at 4 p.m. ET on Saturday.)

"For being off that long, we put a lot of rubber on them," said Hunter, whose team missed a golden opportunity to tie it up when Vancouver Canucks. "We created a lot of pressure on our chances and just couldn't bury them."

The result marked the sixth Cup opener in a row where the host team has lost after failing to go in through the figurative front door as league champion. Three of the previous five recovered and reached the final, with the 2012 Shawinigan Cataractes winning it all. The Knights' timing might have been a touch off Friday, but they carried a lot of the play.

"I thought we were pretty optimistic saying 'we're gonna get one, we're gonna get one if we keep doing the same things,' " said captain Chris Tierney, who took responsibility for the bad pass that Mantha turned into the only goal. "That didn't happen. It's tough. We're going to have to go back to the drawing board and find things that work."

The overhanging question with Val-d'Or is how long it can go before without hitting a wall emotionally. It was a given that there would be some carryover from the elation of Tuesday's last-minute win in Baie-Comeau to Friday night at Budweiser Gardens. Durocher espied some"mental fatigue" popping up like dandelions as the evening progressed.

"We try to keep the emotion of that game for the first game here at least," Durocher said. "We looked at the schedule, two days off [before facing Guelph on Monday], and that's going to be important.

"Winning the first is important because we took all of the pressure of our shoulders and put it on the other team. At least with one win, we should have a [guarantee of a] tiebreaker. Those two days off will be good for regaining our energy."

"We need to play better defensively," added Durocher, who's coaching in his second Memorial Cup after finishing second in 2002 with the Victoriaville Tigres. "Bibs was outstanding tonight. The second shot was not there often, but we gave away too many shots from the slot. At one point we got mentally tired. Instead of stopping and starting, we were turning.

Do keep in mind the last two Cups each had all four teams square at 1-1 after the first four days, so essentially the tournament didn't even really start on Friday. The late-game drama made for a good first chapter, though.

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet.