Final Results
Oct 21, 07 - 15:00

Redmen 3 - Concordia (Corey Cup @ Bell Centre) 1
Non-conference Game

Game Report by Earl Zukerman

MONTREAL – For an exhibition hockey game that didn’t have any bearing on the league standings, the 21st annual Ronald Corey Cup was a pretty impressive spectacle.

Sam Bloom scored the game-winner and set up two others as McGill defeated Concordia 3-1 to capture the coveted Cup before 5,406 raucous fans at the Bell Centre, Sunday.

It was the largest crowd to see a university hockey contest in Montreal since 1968, when 12,000 packed into the old Forum to see Loyola play Alberta in the final of the Canadian university championships.

“It was a fantastic experience,” said long-time Redmen head coach Martin Raymond. “When I played (with McGill) at the Forum… we didn’t get the same fan support that we had today. The fans were great, it was a good atmosphere and the Canadiens put on a first-class show, with the Jumbotron and the whole nine-yards.”

McGill outshot the Stingers 37-20 in a spirited affair that featured two fights and 110 penalty minutes, including 58 to Concordia.

Bloom, a 21-year-old management junior from Toronto, was selected as the game’s first star. He assisted on freshman Simon Courcelles’s power play marker to open the scoring at 12:14 of the opening period, then made it 2-0 when he beat Stingers’ netminder Patrick Lepage at 13:56 of the second. Bloom also set up the insurance goal by veteran Shawn Shewchuk, on the power play at 18:41 of the final stanza.

Senior netminder Mathieu Poitras started and saved all 15 shots he faced but was not credited with the victory, which went to Jean-Michel Filiatrault who allowed one goal on five shots in only nine minutes and 50 seconds. Filiatrault entered the game midway through the middle period as planned but pulled his groin late in the period and did not return after the intermission.

Lepage, who made 34 saves in a losing cause, was picked as the second star, while Redmen rearguard Ken Morin had two assists and was the third star. The junior from St. Prosper, Que., was one of the students involved in the proposal to have the game played at the Bell Centre. Poitras and McGill captain David Urquhart of Thorold, Ont., were the other organizers.

“This whole event was designed to help fundraise for all 48 varsity teams at McGill,” said Morin, who was thinking about ways to fundraise for the team’s upcoming Christmas trip to Serbia and came up with the idea to play at the Bell Centre last May. “Our plan was to have all varsity teams sell tickets (and make a commission off each sale). We’re really happy with the results and the tremendous support we got from the student body.“

McGill, which retained possession of the Corey Cup for the sixth straight year, leads the series with a 10-6-3 record since the annual affair was initiated in 1988 by Ronald Corey, then-president of the Montreal Canadiens. Corey was on hand to perform the ceremonial faceoff and present the Cup after the game. The Stingers fell to 7-11-3 in Cup play, which is symbolic of university hockey supremacy in Quebec. The UQTR Patriotes, who played twice for the Cup in the early 1990s, are 1-1.

“Today was a phenomenal day for university hockey,” said Concordia coach Kevin Figsby. “It is our (long-term) intention to mirror the highly-successful Beanpot tournament in Boston, where we could have a four-team tourney with McGill, Concordia, Boston University and Boston College. People underestimate the calibre of university hockey and I think those who came today saw that it is the best calibre of hockey in the city, next to the Canadiens. They’ll all come back next year and bring their friends.”

The Redmen, which improved to 5-4 overall, resume regular season play at Ottawa on Oct. 27. McGill will get another shot at playing in an NHL arena when they return to the nation’s capital on Nov. 4 for a league game at Scotiabank Place.

SCORING SUMMARY

Concordia 1 at McGill 3

(21st Corey Cup, Oct 21, 2007 @ Bell Centre)

FIRST PERIOD:
Scoring -
1. McGill, S. Courcelles (1) (K. Morin, S. Bloom) 12:14 PP

Penalties -
B. Gazdic Mcg (interference) 4:52,
B. Beauchamp Con (interference) 5:38,
J. Goodsell Con (slashing) 7:37,
G. Demers Mcg (interference) 8:43,
S. Sauve Con (roughing) 11:06,
B. Arsenault Mcg (inter. on goaltender) 13:19,
Y. Turcotte Mcg (roughing) 17:23

SECOND PERIOD:
Scoring -
2. McGill, S. Bloom (1) (L. Allaire, S. Shewchuk) 13:56
3. Concordia, M. Element (1) (B. Beauchamp, D. Toupikov) 14:22

Penalties -
B. Gazdic Mcg (interference) 7:36,
J. Burgess Mcg (cross checking) 14:57,
Mcg, bench served by G. Doucet (too many men) 19:03

THIRD PERIOD:
Scoring -
4. McGill, S. Shewchuk (1) (S. Bloom, K. Morin) 18:41 PP

Penalties -
R. Tremblay Con (hooking) 5:39,
G. Boies Con (checking from behind, game misconduct) 15:50,
R. Des Alliers Con (fighting, game misconduct) 15:50,
N. Lafontaine Con (roughing, roughing) 15:50,
B. Gazdic Mcg (roughing) 15:50,
L. Verrilli Mcg (roughing) 15:50,
E. Vossen Mcg (fighting, game misconduct) 15:50,
T. Blanchard Con (inter. on goaltender) 17:24,
M. Baslyk Con (slashing) 18:56,
J. Goodsell Con (fighting, game misconduct) 18:56,
C. Churchill-Smith Mcg (slashing) 18:56,
D. Urquhart Mcg (instigator, fighting, game misconduct) 18:56

SHOTS BY PERIOD:
CON: 6 8 6 -- 20
MCG: 11 11 15 -- 37

POWER PLAY:
Concordia 0-8.
McGill 2-6.

GOALTENDERS

Concordia
Patrick Lepage --- (59:41 SV: 34 GA: 3 [L])

McGill
Mathieu Poitras (0-0-0 Start; 49:50; SV: 15 GA: 0)
J.M. Filiatrault (1-0-0;: 2nd 9:50 Min: 10:10 SV: 4 GA: 1 [W]

Start : 3:10 PM

End : 5:27 PM

Attendance : 5346

Referee: Nicolas Dutil

MOLSON CUP THREE STARS:
1. Sam Bloom, McGill
2. Patrick Lepage
3. Ken Morin, McGill

-----------------

Corey Cup: College hockey a big winner Oct 22, 07 Ice Hockey (M)

By RANDY PHILLIPS, The Gazette

College hockey a big winner
Redmen upend stingers. Largest crowd for men's game in 20 years invades Bell Centre

by RANDY PHILLIPS
(reprinted from The Gazette)

The Corey Cup had no significance in the league standings, but it was far from a meaningless game.

Played at the Bell Centre for the first time and before 5,345, the largest crowd to see a university men's hockey game in the city in nearly 20 years, it was a showcase for an exciting brand of hockey that has been a best-kept secret.

The McGill Redmen skated to a 3-1 victory over the Concordia Stingers in yesterday's 21th edition of the event, named in honour of former Canadiens president Ronald Corey, to keep possession of the trophy for the sixth consecutive year.

But it was clear that with the excitement generated inside the Bell Centre and the play of both teams, aside from the end-of-game fisticuffs that saw as many as five players suspended for the next league game, college hockey was the big winner on this day.

"This was fantastic," said McGill head coach Martin Raymond, who played with the Redmen back in the late 1980s when the first Corey Cup games were held at the Montreal Forum.

"I can't speak for the players, but if I compare this to when I played, this was a way better experience.

"With the fan support and the way this was organized by the (athletic) departments of both schools and the support of the Canadiens to allow us to come here, everything has been terrific," Raymond said.

The Corey Cup is the property of Concordia, but three Redmen players, veteran defenceman Ken Morin, David Urquhart, also McGill's team captain, and all-Canadian goaltender Mathieu Poitras, were instrumental in promoting the idea to have this year's game, normally part of the regular season, to be an exhibition to raise funds for both programs.

McGill, whose supporters probably numbered more than 4,000, hosted this year's game. It will be Concordia's turn next year when the game also will be at the Bell Centre.

"I'd like to see this game here every year," Stingers head coach Kevin Figsby said. "When we talked to the Canadiens, their focus was to try to create an event like this on an annual

basis and maybe eventually something that mirrors the hugely successful Bean Pot tournament in Boston.

"I think with the performance seen out there today, it warrants another opportunity to come back," he said. "From a university student's experience, today was the ultimate."

Third-year centre Sam Bloom led McGill with a goal and two assists and Urquhart had a goal and an assist, while forward Simon Courcelles also scored for the Redmen, which led 1-0 after the first period and 2-1 after the second.

Forward Marc-André Element scored the Stingers' lone goal, while goalie Patrick Lepage, arguably the best player on the ice and at times getting little help from his defence faced 37 shots. More than 100 minutes in penalties called, most for an altercation in the final

seconds when five players, including three Stingers, received match penalties for various fighting infractions.

Concordia and McGill are 3-1 and 2-2, respectively, in regular-season play in the OUA Far East Division and face each other in the first of four regular-season games, Nov. 28, at McGill's McConnell Arena.

"It's electrifying to play a game in front of a crowd like that," Urquhart said. "It's not tough to get up for it when there are several thousand more people in the stands than what you're used to. The fact it was against Concordia made it that much more of a big event."

rphillips@thegazette.canwest.com
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2007