The Carleton Ravens men’s hockey team fell 4-1 to an efficient Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR) Patriotes team in a hard-hitting game Feb. 11 at the Ice House.


The loss, Carleton’s first at home since November, saw the Ravens collect 78 penalty minutes thanks to a late brawl that resulted in six misconducts.


Before the gloves were dropped, however, the Ravens looked sluggish throughout the game — despite defeating the high-flying McGill Redmen twice in the previous two weeks.


“Some games you just get outplayed and that was one of them,” said Ravens captain Brad Good.


First-year forward Jeff Hayes then had the team’s best chance of the opening frame when he deked the Patriotes goalie, but his shot hit the back of the pads before being frozen.


The Ravens tried to create offence by using the wings but found very little success, with sloppy passing limiting their attack.


“We just couldn’t find a way to get any momentum,” said Ravens head coach Marty Johnston. “Guys tried, and maybe tried to do too much. I don’t know but we didn’t have our legs.”


Despite outshooting the Patriotes, the Ravens fell behind after Pierre-Alexandre Joncas weaved his way through the defence before slipping the puck past goaltender Ryan Dube.


The Ravens came out for the second frame with a little more drive as rookie forward Joe Pleckaitis had a shot cleared just off the line.
After another UQTR marker, the Ravens, seeking redemption, responded with Linden Bahm tucking the puck just in the far post to pull the deficit back to one.


But just a minute later, a scrum in front of the Ravens’ net produced a goal for UQTR as Carleton’s players stood looking stunned.


Near the end of the second period, Carleton strode up ice desperately trying to find a goal, but it was the Patriotes who scored again, this time against the run of play.


The game took an ugly turn in the third and final frame. After a flurry of chances for Carleton, third-year forward Shane Bakker was ejected for punching a UQTR player on the bench, after seemingly being provoked. Ravens assistant coach Ryan Medel was then given a game misconduct for arguing with the referee.


“We’ve always had a rivalry with these guys,” Bakker said. “We’re gonna try to forget about this game and turn the page.”


With three minutes to go, a clearance from the Ravens defence ended up in the Patriotes bench with their head coach taking objection. After angrily throwing the puck at the Ravens, he too was ejected.


Fights broke out as the referees desperately tried to intervene. A total of six misconducts were handed out in the last three minutes of the game.


The Ravens did regroup with a 5-2 win over the Concordia Stingers on Saturday. The win sealed third spot in the OUA East standings.
 

“We knew it was a huge two points and we wanted to get the momentum back for the playoffs,” Good said.