Comments / New

Memorial Cup: Rockets blast Remparts 9-3 to land in final

The Kelowna Rockets easily dismissed the host Quebec Remparts with a 9-3 rout in the semifinal game of the 2015 Mastercard Memorial Cup. The Rockets will meet the OHL champion Oshawa Generals in Sunday night’s CHL title bout at 7:00 pm. The Josh Brown-captained Generals went a perfect 3-0 during round robin play and have been off since beating Kelowna 2-1 on Tuesday.

Early on, the game looked like nothing like the rout it would become after the first period. Quebec’s Adam Erne opened the scoring with an unassisted goal at the 3:11 mark before Chance Braid equalized midway through the frame from Tomas Souster and Cole Linkater.

The Rockets blew the game open with three goals in the first 4:06 of the second period. Leon Draisaitl notched a power-play goal 17 seconds into the frame which was quickly followed up by another man-advantage strike from Justin Kirkland. Kirkland scored again 46 seconds later at even-strength to complete the barrage.

Josh Morrissey, who assisted on the first two goals of the second, lit the lamp with 3:14 left in the period, from Joe Gatenby and Kirkland, to put Kelowna up 5-1 after forty minutes.

In third period, Remparts forward Anthony Duclair scored to give his team a brief glimmer of hope that was quickly snuffed out by goals from Rockets Rourke Chartier and Linkater.

Dmitry Timashov bagged a power-play marker for the last Quebec goal before Tyson Baillie and Chartier tallied for the Kelowna to complete the scoring.

Kirkland finished the game with four points on two goals and two assists to go along with a +3 rating while Edmonton’s Draisaitl added two assists to his goal.

Jackson Whistle made 20 saves to get the win while Montreal prospect Zachary Fucale went the distance for the tired Remparts, finishing with 35 stops on 44 shots.