Costly penalties turn early lead into season-ending loss to Griffins

Scott Radley
The Hamilton Spectator

(Apr 27, 2009)

Each spring, the Hamilton Bulldogs present awards for best player, best defenceman and a bunch of other stuff. Next year, they can add the Yanick Lehoux Stupidest Penalty Award.

With the desperate-to-stay-alive Dogs up 1-0 and carrying the play in the first period, things were looking pretty good for the home side. Then, as Chad Anderson was being led off to the box for a roughing penalty, Lehoux decided it was time to exhibit some ill-timed toughness.

Ignoring the fact the ref was staring right at him, he skated up to Grand Rapids’ Francis Pare and punched him in the face. Suddenly instead of a mere power play — a bad enough option considering how potent the visitors have been in such circumstances — the Griffins suddenly had a two-man advantage that they quickly translated into a Darren Haydar goal.

You want your TSN Turning Point? This was it times 10.

This moronic penalty topped even Greg Stewart’s pair of boneheaded plays the game before in Grand Rapids that cost Hamilton that contest. Which is saying something.

Good teams play close to the edge without abandoning discipline. On the flip side, teams that have players taking lazy hooking penalties in the offensive zone, or stupid retaliation infractions, don’t deserve to win.

And, in the end, the Bulldogs didn’t deserve this series. Grand Rapids was the better team. They caught the Bulldogs flat in the first two games to steal home-ice advantage, didn’t blow things on their own ice, and took advantage of their chances last night. They blocked more shots, had more jump and took better advantage of opportunities presented to them.

And they didn’t take monumentally idiotic penalties at key times.

That said, it’s hard not to see the Bulldogs’ euthanization as the final act of a seven-month-long pleasant surprise, rather than a devastating body blow.

Back in October, little was expected of this club. Nobody expected them to score much. The playoffs were a huge question mark. The cupboard was thought to be quite bare prospect-wise. And goaltending was uncertain.

They answered nearly every one of those doubts. They scored a ton. They finished with the second-best record in franchise history.

The prospect concern was answered when a handful of Bulldogs were in the Habs’ playoff lineup, though that’s not necessarily a ringing endorsement considering how well that went. And the goaltending was great. Marc Denis, who was the undisputed team MVP, and far better than advertised, serving as an absolute saviour for this group many nights.

For all this, a fair bit of heaping praise should go to Don Lever – who ought to get some serious consideration for an NHL job this off-season – and Ron Wilson who did a strong job behind the bench in the regular season. And some plaudits are in order for GM Julien BriseBois who put together a decent group of veterans and prospects.

Yet even with all that, there’s no getting around the fact that the first round is the first round, and more is always expected. Anyone who can look at this season and proclaim it a huge success just isn’t all that interested in winning.

In the playoffs, the Bulldogs were the second most-energetic group on the ice most nights. It was a team that overachieved until it really mattered, then didn’t produce. And home-ice advantage hardly seemed worth the huge effort it took to get it.

Next year may bring a better outcome, but with 10 unrestricted free agents in Montreal that could open roster spots for some of this year’s graduates — and Hamilton facing a handful of guys on expiring contracts, too — who knows?

This was one of those rare chances to pull a rabbit out of a hat in a year few expected it. A chance to do something special.

For a while it looked good. But making magic requires discipline. When it counted most, the Dogs didn’t have enough of that.

And yesterday’s 4-1 scoreline was perhaps the best reflection of the difference between the two teams.