By: Omran Wahidy
The Roughnecks closed out week two of training camp with a 13-6 victory over the defending champion Buffalo Bandits.
Riggers forward Mathieu Gautier continued his hot streak putting up another hat-trick after doing the same Friday night against Rochester in 16-13 win.
STATS
Mathieu Gautier – three goals
Tyler Pace – two goals
Noah Manning – one goal
Justin Inacio – one goal
Brayden Laity – one goal
Tanner Cook – one goal
Haiden Dickson – one goal
Tyler Hendrycks – one goal
Lukas Olsson – one goal
Riley Loewen – one goal
The Bandits opened up the scoring a couple minutes into the game but the Riggers responded with a goal just a minute later to tie it up from rookie Noah Manning, the recent ninth overall pick in the NLL draft. He continued his hot start in preseason play after scoring five goals just the night before.
Just a minute later Gautier potted his first goal of the afternoon to extend the lead to 2-1.
On the following offensive possession, Pace made his presence felt after rifling a shotfor his first goal of the preseason. The Riggers offence continued to hum after Inacio scored his first to extend the lead to 4-1.
The lamp continued to be lit when Gautier crashed the net for his second goal of the game. The Roughnecks weren’t done yet. On the following offensive play, Pace sniped home his second of the game to stretch the lead to 6-1 after the first quarter.
In the second quarter the Riggers started on a powerplay just 30 seconds into the frame. Cook capitalized on the man advantage and scored his first of the game for a 7-1 lead.
The offence continued to flow for the Roughnecks even on the penalty-kill, this time Laity ran it down on the transition to score his first.
A minute later, Pace found Dickson In front and he buried home his first of the afternoon to give the Riggers an eight-goal lead.
Gautier stayed red hot, scored his third of the game with a few minutes left before half. The St. Albert product and the Riggers had a 10-1 lead with a couple minutes remaining at half.
The Bandits showed some signs of life with 40 seconds remaining when Mike Triolo leaped over and put one past Aden Walsh, but the Roughnecks went to the half with a 10-2 lead.
In the third quarter, the Riggers got the scoring started with a nice finish from Hendrycks assisted by Gautier to stretch the lead to 11-2.
The Bandits had a surge early in the fourth quarter with goals from Clay Scanlan and Cam Wyers to cut to 11-4 with 11 minutes remaining.
Buffalo kept on the attack on the following offensive possession with a goal on the man advantage.
The Roughnecks got back on the attack with a powerplay when Riley Loewen finished off a great feed from Pace.
On the next possession, rookie Lukas Olsson scored his first of the preseason to extend the lead to 13-5 with under six minutes remaining in the game.
The Bandits got one back on a penalty shot goal from Scanlan for his second of the game to round out the scoring.
UP NEXT:
The team heads to back to Calgary for a final preseason scrimmage with the Saskatchewan Rush on November 22nd in Okotoks. Game time is TBD, stay tuned to Roughnecks social media for more information.
