Oct. 6, 1999
QUEBEC CITY -- You could hardly craft a better script for the Providence Bruins.
On Friday night, they'll hoist their Calder Cup championship banner from last season to the rafters at the Providence Civic Center and receive their championship rings.
They'll do it after a perfect 3-0 season-opening road trip, which was completed last night with a 4-1 victory against the Citadelles. Quebec replaced the Fredericton Canadiens as Montreal's AHL affiliate.
``That's they way we wanted to start off the season, especially when you start off on the road,'' said Providence defenseman Johnathan Aitken, who was a part of the last year's team.
P-Bruins coach Peter Laviolette agreed.
``That's what we set for ourselves,'' he said. ``We wanted to take them one at a time, but tonight was the big one (so we) could bring it back 3-0. There's a lot of buzz going on in Providence. We're getting jammed houses (a full Civic Center) on the weekend, so we wanted to make sure we did our part.''
The P-Bruins, who had notched two 6-1 victories at St. John's over the weekend, may have been ripe for a letdown. But other than being penalty prone, which resulted in one goal, there was nothing to complain about.
``We still have a few things to work on,'' Aitken said, ``but we're going to be all right.''
Providence got goals from Andre Savage, Tim Lovell, Joe Hulbig, and newcomer Eric Cairns, who joined the club on Monday. Both Savage and Lovell have tallied in all three games, and last night they provided enough firepower to support the work of goalie Maxime Gingras, who stopped all but one of 32 shots in his first AHL start.
It took just 1:38 for the P-Bruins to grab a 1-0 lead, thanks to Savage's third goal of the season. Despite being hauled down by defenseman Pierre Sevigny, Savage managed to flick the puck in over the shoulder of Citadelle goalie Mathieu Garon.
The P-Bruins soon got into penalty trouble, taking three successive minor penalties, but Gingras was able to hold off the swarming Quebec attackers, who took most of their 10 first-period shots while holding a man-advantage.
Gingras enjoyed a bit of luck at the 7:00 mark, with Shane Belter off for hooking, when a blast from the left point by Jesse Belanger got through him, but stopped short of the goal line. P-Bruin defenseman Elias Abrahamsson eventually swooped in and swept it out of the crease.
With 12 seconds left in the period, Lovell picked up a rebound of a shot by Sean Pronger and tucked it behind Garon, giving the P-Bruins a 2-0 lead that took them into intermission.
A golden opportunity to pad the lead presented itself midway through the second period, when the P-Bruins had a two-man advantage for 1:20. Despite putting good pressure on Quebec backup goalie Dan Murphy, who replaced Garon at the start of the period, the P-Bruins came away empty-handed.
Belanger cashed in a three-way passing play while Providence was short-handed late in the period to bring Les Citadelles to within a goal.
``I didn't think we played particularly well in the first two periods,'' Laviolette admitted, ``but I thought we got stronger in the third.''
The P-Bruins sealed the game in the third, on goals by Hulbig, a former PC Friar, and Cairns, who burst out of the penalty box and buried a breakaway with 3:07 remaining.
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