The North Dundas Rockets travelled to the Morrisburg Arena on Sat., Sept. 29, to take on the Lions in the NCJHL. The Rockets rookie forward, Carter Tait tries to slide one in the five-hole but the Lions’ goaltender, Morgan Penwell steers it aside. The Lions’ defenseman, Brennan Revell tries to prevent the puck from going across the crease. Tait scored his first goal as a Rocket but the Lions surprised the Rockets with a 3-2 victory.      Moore photo

Jeff Moore
Record Staff
MORRISBURG—The North Dundas Rockets had just a single game this past weekend as they travelled to Morrisburg to take on the Lions on Saturday night.

Lions 3 Rockets 2
The North Dundas Rockets travelled to the Morrisburg Arena on Sat., Sept. 29, to take on the Lions in the NCJHL. The Rockets were still looking for their first win of the season and thought this would be a good game to do it but they went into the game down five regulars and dressed three affiliated players.

The Rockets opened the scoring at 10:43 of the first period as Carter Tait snuck one in from around the net from Hugo Lusignan and Brad Stitt to take a 1-0 lead. The Rockets outshot the Lions in the first period 15-12 but only took a 1-0 lead into the first intermission.

The Rockets took a two-goal lead when Brad Nash pounded home a rebound from Justin Lefebvre at 9:33 of the second period. The Lions got on the board at 12:13 as Graham Robertson slid one home from Kage Hallett and Hayden Hoerner to make it 2-1.

The Lions outshot the Rockets 13-11 in the second but trailed 2-1 heading into the second intermission. The play was very defensive in the third period with the teams getting limited scoring chances as the Rockets tried to hold on to the one-goal lead.

With time winding down in regulation, the Lions pulled their goalie in favour of an extra attacker and it paid off as Marc Antoine Doyon fired one home from the right hand side of the net from Zach Leblanc with just 39 seconds remaining tying the game at two.

After the drop of the puck, the Rockets took the puck down to the Lions end but couldn’t hold them there for long as they broke out of their zone, the Rockets were in the midst of a line change and the defensemen got mixed up at the bench allowing the Lions’ Brandon Cameron to steal the puck and go in alone on a breakaway and he made it count beating the Rockets’ goalie, Caleb Gervais glove side with just four seconds left in the game.

The Lions picked up their first victory of the season 3-2. The Rockets remain winless in the season with a 0-3 start, the first time they have lost three games in a row since the Embrun Panthers beat them in the 2016-17 championship series.

The Lions outshot the Rockets 38-35. Picking up the win in the Lions’ goal was Morgan Penwell making 33 saves and suffering the loss for the Rockets was Gervais making 35 saves.

Up next
The North Dundas Rockets travel to the Ingredion Centre in Cardinal on Sat., Oct. 6, to take on the South Grenville Rangers at 8:40 p.m.