Mooseheads melt down

Some losses are more aggravating than others and the Halifax Mooseheads’ latest was pretty high on the scale.

The Mooseheads were in complete control of Sunday’s road game against the Moncton Wildcats until they weren’t. The Wildcats erased a 4-0 Halifax lead with five goals in the final 27 minutes to steal a 5-4 win in front of 4,715 fans at the Avenir Centre.

“I think it’s a mixture of things,” Mooseheads head coach Sylvain Favreau said. “On two of their goals we were cheating offensively so we paid cash on those. But at the same time they got some bounces off (Halifax defenceman Brady) Schultz’s rear end on two of the goals. But we also got a little bit complacent at times and thought it was going to be easy. They turned it on and they got some fortunate bounces and a fortunate call at the end to be on the power play, then it hits (goalie Mathis) Rousseau’s head and goes right to their player.

“So things that don’t typically happen, happened but that’s karma. Sometimes I talk about good karma but in this case it was bad karma. You’ve got to make sure you play 60 minutes and no team in this league, including the Wildcats, is ever out of it. That’s the lesson for us today.”

After two goals from Evan Boucher and one each from Mathieu Cataford and Zachary L’heureux in the opening period and a half, the Mooseheads seemed well on their way to an easy win. But the Wildcats scored three times before the second intermission to cut the lead to 4-3 and then completed the comeback with two more goals late in the third. Maxim Barbashev scored the winner with just 1:54 left in regulation time.

“There are lessons to be learned off every game but especially this one,” Favreau said. “You’re playing a pesky team that’s known to come back in games. They do it all the time. We had to manage that much, much better and we didn’t. Sometimes when you play with fire you burn yourself and today we burned oursevels.”

Alex Mercier, with two, Etienne Morin and Vincent Labelle had the goals for the Wildcats and Francesco Iasenza and Anthony Hamel each finished with two assists. Jordan Dumais set up three goals for the Mooseheads to increase his league-leading points total to 54 in 24 games.

Jacob Steinman made 26 saves for Moncton and Mathis Rousseau turned aside 25 shots for Halifax.

BOUCHER EXTENDS HEATER

On a more positive note, Boucher only needed 61 seconds to extend his goalscoring streak.

The 20-year-old tipped Owen Phillips’ point shot on his first shift of the game to give him goals in six straight games. He added a second goal in the second period and has now scored nine times during the heater.

“We’re happy with his production and overall that line (with Cataford and Dumais) has been playing some good hockey,” Favreau said. “But we have to make sure we play tight defensively and we can’t cheat the game so that’s the main message.”

The Mooseheads (147-2-1) will now head to Quebec for their next three games, starting on Wednesday against the Rimouski Oceanic. They also play the Chicoutimi Sagueneens on Friday and the Baie-comeau Drakkar on Saturday.

Notes: James Swan, Dylan Mackinnon and Jake Todd were out of the lineup for Halifax . ... The Cape Breton Eagles scored twice in the final three minutes to tie the Charlottetown Islanders but then fell short in the shootout. The 4-3 loss earns a point for the Eagles, who got two goals from Ivan Ivan and one from Thomas Desruisseaux. Giovanni Morneau scored two for Charlottetown and Keiran Gallant had one.