by Romano Di Franco
The Raiders got down 4-0 before battling back to make a game of it. After Luca Nocita opened the scoring with a pair of goals making it 2-0 Kanata. The two goals give him goal numbers 23 and 24 on the season and that ties him for eleventh in the league in goals. The two teams went into the dressing room after 20 minutes with the Lasers up by two.
Paul Larabie also registered his 23rd of the year at 1:23 of the second period and Yancy Whitaker scored just 30 seconds later to give the Lasers a four goal cushion. Kanata was done with the scoring for the rest of the game but the second period would see two more goals scored as the Raiders came back on goals by Patrick Larkin who got his ninth of the season and then Evan Boucher scored just 71 second later to make it a 4-2 game. The goal was Boucher’s team-leading nineteen goal and second goal in as many games.
The shot totals were 39-35 in favour of Kanata and that was the highest total for the Raiders since January 29 when they also had 35 shots against the Pembroke Lumber Kings.
This was the last meeting between the two teams for the 2019/2020 season with the Lasers having a 5-0-1 record in the series and outscored the Raiders 22-12.
The special teams played well as the Raiders killed off all three short-handed situations. They had just two chances with the man-advantage but could not capitalize as Jean-Philippe Tourigny turned aside 33 of the 35 shots he faced. At the other end of the ice, Tyler Laureault stopped 35 of the 39 pucks directed his way.
The Raiders had another comeback fall just short after digging a hole that was a little to deep to claw their way out of. Tyson Tomasini had a assist on the Larkin goal while Matt McQuade had the helper on the Boucher goal giving him five points in his last three games.
Tyler Laureault had a solid bounce back game against the fifth place Lasers who now find themselves four points out of the fourth-and-final playoff spot in the Robinson Division despite having two games in hand on the fourth place Lumber Kings.
With his one goal and two assist performance, Paul Larabie was named the game’s first star while Luca Nocita earned the second star with a pair of goals. Evan Boucher was the game’s third star.
The Raiders next game is Friday, February 21 when they travel to the Robert Hartley Sports Complex to take on the Hawkesbury Hawks for a 7:30pm puck drop.
