Royals outplay first place Casselman but lose third straight CCHL2 game

November 4, 2019 2 min read

By Jeff Morris

Manotick Messenger

A three-game losing streak may sound like a slump, but when you consider the schedule and the opposition, the Richmond Royals are anything but in a slump.

For the second straight Sunday afternoon, the Royals dropped a Central Canada Hockey League 2 home game to the first place juggernaut Casselman Vikings, with a Wednesday night loss to a tough Brockville Tikis team on the road in between.

Sunday at the Richmond Memorial Centre, the Royals skated with and even outplayed the Vikings for the much of the game, but the visitors pulled away for a 5-2 win.

The Royals outshot Casselman 21-9 in the third period, and also outshot them in the game by a 43-32 margin.

Richmond opened the scoring on the power play just 55 seconds after the opening face off as Ryan Mann netted his seventh goal of the year from Patrick Yates and Curran Gilmour.

The Vikings came back early in the second, scoring twice in a 28-second span as Maxime Desjardins and Adam Paquette scored. Midway through the period, Gilmour’s first of the year from Yates and Mann tied the score.

Casselman took the lead with just over a minute to play in the second, as Francois Drouin scored to give the Vikings the lead.

In the third period, the Royals thoroughly outplayed the Vikings, but strong goaltending by the game’s first star, Zachary Racine, prevented the Royals from netting the equalizer. Justin Gregoire scored for Casselman with 3:40 left, and then Samuel Labre added a shorthanded empty net goal to make the final score 5-2.

The Royals had lost 8-4 in Brockville Wed., Oct. 30. Adam Goodfellow scored a pair with Patrick Yates adding a goal and an assist and Dawson Evans also scoring. Ethan Greene, TK Mwamba and Declan Flanagan each had two assists with Grant Cooper adding one.

The Royals are in Winchester to take on the Hawks Friday night. Their next home game is Sun., Nov. 17 against Arnprior. Face off is at 1:30 p.m.