(Belleville) Despite Logan Mailloux’s first professional hockey goal and another productive game from Joshua Roy, the Laval Rocket suffered a 5-4 defeat against the Belleville Senators on Saturday night at the CAA Arena.
In addition to successfully highlighting their local opening, the Senators spoiled the first outing of Jean-François Houle’s men away from Place Bell in 2023-24.
In the defeat, Lias Andersson scored two goals, his fourth and fifth of the season. His second of the evening allowed the Rocket to come within one goal of their opponents with 70 seconds remaining in regulation.
Brandon Gignac (2nd), late in the first period, and Mailloux, early in the third period, scored the other goals for the Rocket (1-3-1) who got 34 shots towards Mads Sogaard.
Some 24 hours after amassing five points, Joshua Roy added two assists, the first on Mailloux’s goal and the second on Andersson’s second.
Defenseman William Trudeau also collected two assists.
Zack McEwen led the Senators attack with a double. He received support from Zack Ostapchuk, who had a goal and an assist.
Brennan Saulnier and Graham McPhee also fooled Strauss Mann, who faced 36 pucks.
With the exception of a very brief sequence in the second period, the Rocket trailed throughout the game.
McPhee gave the Senators the lead at 2:04 of the opening period and McEwen made it 2-0 midway through the period.
Gignac brought the Rocket back to life by hitting the target at 19:28 of the first period, and Andersson tied the game at 1:31 of the middle period.
However, it only took the Senators 11 seconds to regain the lead when Ostapchuk found the back of the net. Saulnier also beat Mann at 13:09 of the period, after which the Senators led 4-2.
Mailloux restarted the Rocket at 1:28 of the third period, but McEwen completed his double at 16:50, two minutes before Andersson scored his second of the match, in turn.
The Rocket will resume training on Tuesday at Place Bell, in preparation for its next two outings abroad. On Friday, the Rocket will visit the Rochester Americans and the next day, they will stop in Syracuse to face the Crunch.
