Brendan Dumas and Michael Young scored to lead to the visiting Titans to a 2 – 1 win over the Maine Nordiques for the Red Buckets sixth straight win and eighth out of their last ten games.
The Titans are assured to finish in second place in the regular season’s East Division’s standings. Who they play in the first round of the Robertson Cup playoffs is anyone’s guess now based off the logjam between three teams.
Dumas opened the scoring at 6:43 into the first period. With the puck in Maine’s zone, Nordiques defenseman David Helledy brought the puck from behind his own net and up along the near side boards, but he was knocked off the biscuit at the point by Young who tap passed the puck to Dumas. As Dumas went to the cage, he took a shot that beat Nordiques goaler Thomas Heaney short side for Dumas’ sixteenth goal of the season.
After a scoreless second, Young scored just twenty-nine seconds into the final period to double the Titans lead. Maine’s Evan Orloff kept the puck in the offensive zone at the top of the far side point but his pass off the boards was intercepted at the half wall by Sylas Oberting. Oberting skated towards the faceoff circle, turned, and made a bounce pass off the boards to Young who went through center ice and into the offensive zone. As Young gained the line, he rushed towards the net and took a backhanded shot that went through Heaney’s five hole for Young’s 26th goal of the season, which ties him with Anthony Calafiore and Gavin Gulash for the most goals scored in a season.
Maine’s John-Paul Steele scored from in close at nine minutes into the final period to cut the Titans lead in half but it wasn’t enough as the Red Buckets defeated the Nordiques for the third straight time.
Brice stopped 22 of 23 shots while Heaney turned aside 37 of 39. Click here for the complete box score.