AMHERST – It was a team effort, and that team included the 875 fans in the stands.
“I can’t say enough good things about our fans tonight. They were there for us right from the warm up right to the end. No matter what the score was, whether we were executing well or not, the fans were right there with us.”
That’s the after-game assessment from Jeff LeBlanc, Ramblers coach and general manager, after his team, the Amherst CIBC Wood Gundy Ramblers, beat the South Shore Lumberjacks 4-3 Saturday night at Amherst Stadium.
With the win, the Ramblers tied their best-of-seven Eastlink South Division series 1-1 with the Lumberjacks.
“All 19 guys played well. I can’t think of one guy right now who didn’t have a good game,” said LeBlanc. “It’s good to see. That’s what we need moving forward and that’s what we need in Game 3.”
The Ramblers lost Game 1 by a score of 5-2 in Bridgewater.
“I didn’t think we played bad in Game 1, I just thought we played a lot better tonight,” said LeBlanc. “We did the little things that we need to do in the playoffs. We blocked more shots than we did in Game 1, we won a lot more face offs, we capitalized on our chances, and our special teams were outstanding.”
The Ramblers scored two power play goals on eight power play chances, and they killed all seven Lumberjacks power plays.
First Period
The Ramblers outscored the Lumberjacks 2-1 in the first period.
Jacob Myra opened the scoring at 5:33 into the game off a pass from Cole Waugh.
The Lumberjacks tied the game 1-1 only 22 seconds later, but Caleb Rich put the Ramblers up 2-1 on a power play goal at the 13:13 mark off assists from Jordan Renaud and Bradley Dawe.
Second Period
The Lumberjacks tied the game 2-2 with 4:34 left in the period, but Dawson Grenier scored one minute later on a power play goal. Brady Griffin-Hefford and Jordan King assisted on the goal.
Third Period
The Lumberjacks, once again tied the game, this time 3-3 at 6:10 into the third period, but Layton Parsons scored the game winner with three minutes left in the game. Will Bower and Grenier assisted on the goal.
Joel Goguen faced 33 shots on the night, and his teammates had 30 shots on the Lumberjacks net.
LeBlanc said the it was great to see the fans continue to cheer the team whenever the Lumberjacks tied the game, especially in the third period.
“When the Lumberjacks tied the game up in the third period, maybe in the regular season we would have got some boos on that, and we didn’t tonight,” said LeBlanc. “The fans stuck with us, and when that happens it’s a huge, huge boost for our players.
“I don’t think the fans really understand how much that means to our team and our players because you could feel it on the bench. You really could. You could feel the emotion on the bench,” he added. “If you’re being dumped on you get low confidence, and tonight we played with high confidence, and it had a lot to do with the people in the stadium tonight. It was great to see.”
Game 3 goes Monday night in Bridgewater.
“We’re going to have a team meeting Sunday. Some guys are going to skate, most guys aren’t. Then we’ll do video late in the afternoon and get ready for Monday,” said LeBlanc. “When you play every second day things happen very quickly. That’s why we say you can’t let your highs get too high or your lows get too low because we have another big game Monday night in their barn. We just have to play the way we played tonight.”
Game 4 is Wednesday night at 7 p.m. at Amherst Stadium.
