Maine Hockey Journal

Pirates loss of focus prove costly

Providence, RI – Before the game even started, it took an ominous twist for the Pirates when J.S. Aubin didn’t appear on the ice for pre-game warm-ups. The outcome was expected as Providence jumped all over the Portland, 4-0, to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-seven Atlantic Division Finals.

It was certainly a shock in the press box as to why Aubin was missing, but the thought is Aubin will be needed, if the Pirates are going to have any success in the division finals.

“He’s got some bumps and bruises that we’re trying to catch up on,” said Pirates coach Kevin Dineen. “He’s a day-to-day guy, right now and we’ll see how he progresses tomorrow.”

In actuality, the Pirates didn’t play bad, but rather they weren’t discipline, which is just as bad. After the first five minutes of the game, the Bruins slowly took the play to the Pirates and they didn’t respond the way they have all season. Ultimately, it cost them in game one of the series.

“No, (it’s not how we wanted to start the series), but the first five minutes was,” said Pirates’ forward Bobby Ryan. “We had them on their toes and a bad response to a goal in the first period and it slowly progress downhill from there.”

The Pirates gave up a season high 10 power plays to the P-Bruins, but fortunately, Providence couldn’t nail one home, going 0-for-34 in the playoffs.

At 14:57, the Bruins went up 1-0 on a goal by upstairs by Pascal Pelletier.

After the goal, the Pirates fell behind the eight ball emotionally taking several bad penalties after losing their composure.

“That’s when our discipline fell apart and we started doing the unintelligent decision making out there and it turns the game into guys doing things that are uncharacteristic on the ice,” said Dineen.

The Pirates only have a short time to dwell on game as they are back at the Dunkin Donuts Center tomorrow at 4:05pm.

“The good thing about a 4 o’clock game tomorrow is there isn’t a whole lot of time to dwell on it,” said Ryan. “I think we kind of go with the two hour rule where we can have it for two hours and then let it go and move to game two tomorrow.”

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Bruno St. Jacques was out of the line up due to an unspecified injury. Taking his place was Brendan Mikkelson, who missed the last four games with a lower body injury.

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