# Mooseheads push past Huskies

The Halifax Mooseheads nearly met their match for the first time in the playoffs on Saturday.

The Rouyn-Noranda Huskies almost upset the home team in Game 1 of their third-round playoff series, but the Mooseheads managed to pulled off a 6-4 win in front of a sellout crowd of 10,595 at the Metro Centre.

"It's not a surprise at all," said Mooseheads forward Jonathan Drouin. "We knew coming into the series they have a really good team. They surprised Quebec (in the second round) for a reason. We've just got to bring it every night and it's a big game tomorrow."

Like they've done in every series so far, the Mooseheads came out flying to start the first game.

Marty Frk and Nathan MacKinnon both scored first-period goals to put Halifax ahead 2-0 early.

But Huskies sniper Nikita Kucherov gave Halifax a wake-up call when he scored with 29.5 seconds left in the first period and then again 38 seconds into the second period.

Drouin and MacKinnon responded with two more goals in the middle of the second period to restore Halifax's two-goal lead, but again Rouyn-Noranda answered.

Jean-Sebastien Dea scored a power-play goal late in the second period to make it 4-3 and Sven Andrighetto tied it on a two-man advantage to open the third.

Drouin answered the bell once again for Halifax when he pushed a rebound over the goal line at 8:58 of the third period and MacKinnon completed his hat trick with an empty-net goal with 29.8 seconds left.

Drouin (two goals, three assists) and MacKinnon (three goals, one assist) combined for nine points.

"They came at us hard and I think kind of caught some guys by surprise; caught most of us by surprise," said Halifax defenceman Matt Murphy. "About half way through the second we kind of woke up and got back into our stride. We started to play our game again.

"It was a fun game out there. Tight games are fun too. It was good, we went out there and competed and we got the job done."

It was the first time this post-season the Mooseheads were pushed and they didn't respond well at a few different points. They went flat for a stretch after Kucherov scored his back-to-back goals and then took a series of questionable penalties to hand the Huskies a few too many power-play chances.

"We were undisciplined -- eight or nine penalties -- and we can't do that against a skilled team like that," said Drouin, the game's first star. "They have skilled players and we can't play like that.

"That's not what you want with that team. They have Kucherov, Andrighetto and those guys. They know how to play offensively and you can't give them that chance."

Zachary Fucale stopped 27 shots for the Mooseheads and Alexandre Belanger made 23 saves for the Huskies.

The win is the Mooseheads' ninth in a row but was also a good reminder of the improved level of play in this round. The Huskies made some outstanding plays with the puck and gave the Mooseheads a good scare.

"Every round the tempo picks up, the intensity picks up and the teams pick up," Murphy said. "Every team's better at the end and everyone wants to win."

Game 2 is on Sunday at the Metro Centre, followed by Games 3 and 4 in Rouyn-Noranda on Tuesday and Thursday. The remainder of the schedule is: Game 5 in Halifax on April 27, Game 6 in Rouyn-Noranda on April 29 and Game 7 in Halifax on May 1.

"I think the main thing is to stay out of the box, but don't sit back or anything," Murphy said of Game 2. "We can't have those little hiccups in our game where they go out and get a couple goals right in a row or anything like that. We've got to stick to the same game plan we had today but we just have to execute it better at some points."

**Drakkar 2, Armada 1:** At Baie-Comeau, Que., Maxim Lamarche snapped a 1-1 tie late in the second period to give the Drakkar their second straight 2-1 win.  
The result gives Baie-Comeau a 2-0 lead in the series.

**Notes:** Brian Lovell, Brennan Bailey, Liam Alcalde, Max Lindsay and Jonathan Lacroix-Courville were healthy scratches for the Mooseheads. ... Drouin's second-period goal was on a penalty shot. He was hooked on a breakaway while killing a penalty.