MONTREAL – Defenceman Sean Larochelle tallied four points, including a hat-trick as top-seeded Concordia survived a late scare and rallied for a 5-4 victory over fourth-place McGill to win the rubber match of their OUA East best-of-three semifinal on Saturday. The game was played before a capacity crowd of about 500 at the Ed Meagher Arena.

McGill, which concluded the 148th year of operation for the men's hockey program, pulled off a stunning 6-1 upset in Game 1 but the Stingers forced a tie-breaker after winning Game 2 by a 5-1 margin. With the series victory, Concordia advances to the OUA East best-of-three final against second-seeded Queen's, which swept Ottawa in the other eastern semifinal. The OUA West final will also pit their top two seeds against each other, namely Toronto Metropolitan University against the Toronto Varsity Blues.

The Gee-Gees have qualified as host team for the U SPORTS Final Eight national championship, which will include all three medal winners from the OUA.

The result was a heart-breaker for the Redbirds, who led 4-3 with 10 minutes to go and squandered a late power-play chance after Larochelle was penalized for tripping at the 18-minute mark of the third period. McGill, which went 4-for-6 on the power-play in the series opener, went 0-for-2 in Game 2 and 0-for-4 in Game 3. Concordia replied with a 1-for-3 success rate in each contest.

McGill got off to a costly slow start, giving up a first shift goal and then taking three consecutive penalties which led to a power-play goal at 9:08.

"After that first 10 minutes, I thought from that point on, we played our best playoff game of the year," said McGill head coach David Urquhart, whose troops outshot Concordia 15-7 in the middle stanza and 7-5 in the final frame. "We had a big second period, caught lightning in a bottle and everything was clicking. The guys have a lot of confidence and belief in each other. Many guys stepped up their game, throughout the lineup.

"The team has gotten much stronger throughout the season and we were peaking at the right time. This is not the result that we wanted but the effort, energy and teamwork was everything that you could ask from the group. I'm proud of every one of them. We had guys playing through injuries and a lot of pain but they wanted to be there for their teammates and that speaks a lot to their character. The sky is the limit for the guys who are returning."

Concordia's Julien Anctil, who opened the scoring just 17 seconds after the initial faceoff, struck for his second marker of the game at 10:20 of the final period to deadlock the score at 4-4. Exactly five minutes later, Larochelle completed his hat-trick with what proved to be game winner on a disputed goal. The winning tally occurred when Larochelle jabbed the puck loose from under the blocker of McGill goaltender Alexis Shank. Two of McGill's captains argued, to no avail, with each referee, that the play should have been whistled dead.

The Redbirds had a 28-23 edge in shots as Shank made 18 saves and took the loss. Stingers goaltender Nikolas Hurtubise saved 24 for the win.

While two players were responsible for all of the scoring for ConU, McGill had five different marksmen, which was the team's trademark throughout the season. Charles-Antoine Dumont tied the score at 1-1 in the first period, while Mikisiw Awashish evened the count at 2-2 in the second. Mathieu Gagnon and Xavier Fortin gave the Redbirds a 4-3 advantage midway through the second period.

McGill dropped to 118-119-14 overall in the lifetime series versus Concordia, including a 23-18 margin in playoffs. The Redbirds have won 11 of 18 post-season series with the Stingers.

The Redbirds finished the 2024-25 campaign with a 25-15-1 record overall, including an 18-9-1 mark in regular season play and a 2-2 record in the post-season.

The Redbirds could lose as many as eight seniors who are expected to graduate. That group includes G Oscar Carsley, who already graduated at Christmas (BA '24; Economics), G Alexis Shank (BA '25; Economics), D Mitchell Prowse (BSc '25, Kinesiology), F Drew Bennett (BA '25; Economics), F Alex Plamondon (BA '25; Economics), ), F Caiden Daley (BA '25; Industrial & Labour Relations), F Brandon Frattaroli (BA '25; Industrial & Labour Relations) and F Zach Gallant (B Com '25; Finance).

Frattaroli ended up leading the team's overall scoring race with 43 points, including 23 goals, in 41 games. Gallant was second with 10-30-40 in 37 contests.

KEY DATES ON THE HORIZON:  The 150th anniversary of  the world's first organized hockey game is approaching. That contest, featuring a number of McGill students, was played on March 3, 1875 at the old Victoria Skating Rink in Montreal. A Quebec government announcement is expected on March 3 that the venue will be designated as a heritage site... The OUA hockey all-stars and major awards are slated to be announced on March 13... The OUA Queen's Cup championship will be played on March 15...  the U SPORTS Final Eight is set for March 20-23 in Ottawa... The Friends of McGill Hockey awards banquet will take place on April 5.
 
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SOURCE
Earl Zukerman
Sports Information Officer
Athletics & Recreation
McGill University
CELL: 514-983-7012
E-MAIL:earl.zukerman@mcgill.ca