In a tense, back-and-forth battle that had the entire Memorial Cup crowd on its feet, the Kitchener Rangers edged out the Chicoutimi Saguenéens 3-2 on Tuesday night in Kelowna to finish a perfect 3-0 round-robin and punch their ticket straight to the championship final. From Luca Romano’s lightning-quick opening snipe just 98 seconds in, through Sam O’Reilly’s gritty rebound goal and Jack Pridham’s momentum-crushing third-period marker, Kitchener showed why they’re the team to beat. But Chicoutimi refused to go quietly—Emile Ricard’s beautiful response and Mavrick Lachance’s late-game dagger made it a white-knuckle finish, all while the ugly shadow of Jordan Tourigny’s skate-stomping incident hung over the rink like a bad smell. It was exactly the kind of hard-nosed, emotional hockey the Memorial Cup is built for.
Shots on goal in the scoreless first period were 8-5 for Chicoutimi
Luca Romano makes it a 1-0 game for the Rangers at 1:38 of the second period. Assist on the goal went to Brampton, Ontario native Tanner Lam–Just 1:38 into the game, a sloppy Chicoutimi turnover at center ice sprung Tanner Lam and Luca Romano on a sweet odd-man rush. Romano cradled the puck with patience, waited out the defender, then ripped a wicked wrister short-side high blocker that beat Lucas Beckman clean to the top corner—pure snipe, and the Rangers had the early lead they never really looked back from.
Sam O’Reilly makes it 2-0 for the Rangers at 3:57 of the second period. The assists on the goal went to Jack Pridham and Dylan Edwards–Early in the second period, Jack Pridham wired a heavy shot from the slot that Lucas Beckman kicked out with his pad, leaving a fat juicy rebound sitting right on the doorstep. Sam O’Reilly, flying in hard from the wing, didn’t waste a breath — he banged it home before the goalie could recover, making it 2-0 Rangers and silencing any Chicoutimi momentum that was starting to build.
Emile Ricard scores for Chicoutimi to get them within one at 8:38 of the second period. The assists on the goal went to Nathan LeCompte and Christophe Bertholet.–Midway through the second, Chicoutimi turned up the pressure with a slick zone entry as Christophe Berthelot and Nathan Lecompte worked a sweet give-and-go through the neutral zone. Emile Ricard zipped in on the rush, took a perfect tape-to-tape feed, and roofed a quick wrister high glove side past Christian Kirsch—pure skill, and just like that the Saguenéens were right back in it at 2-1.
Shots in the second period were 10-7 Kitchener
Jack Pridam makes it a 3-1 game just 21 seconds into the third period. The assists on the goal went to Dylan Edwards and Sam O’Reilly.–Just 21 seconds into the third period, with the game still feeling tight at 2-1, Jack Pridham stepped up on the blue line and let go a heavy seeing-eye wrister. The puck knuckled its way through traffic, found a hole, and snuck past Lucas Beckman to restore that two-goal cushion for Kitchener at 3-1—exactly the kind of veteran move that iced the momentum right when Chicoutimi was sniffing a comeback.
Late in the third period, with the game still hanging in the balance, Chicoutimi defenceman Jordan Tourigny got tangled up with Kitchener forward Christian Humphreys along the boards in a routine puck battle. Instead of fighting clean, Tourigny lifted his left skate and deliberately stomped down on Humphreys’ foot/skate three times—nasty, dangerous stuff that left the Ranger writhing in pain and earned Tourigny an immediate match penalty and ejection. The hockey world absolutely roasted him for it: clips went viral, fans and analysts called it “disgusting,” “coward hockey,” and “cheap as it gets,” with plenty demanding a lifetime ban. Kitchener’s coach labelled it straight-up cowardice, while the CHL quickly suspended Tourigny for the rest of the tournament. A few voices pushed back against the death threats and pile-on, but the overwhelming reaction was pure outrage—no place for that garbage in the game.
Mavrick Lachance got Chicoutimi back with one at 16:06 of the third period. The assists on the goal went to Emmanuel Vermette and Liam Lefebvre.–With 3:54 left in the third and the power play from Tourigny’s stomp just expired, a chaotic scramble along the boards left a loose puck trickling right through the blue paint. Mavrick Lachance, parked out back door, calmly buried Emmanuel Vermette’s quick feed into the open net—clean tap-in that suddenly made it a 3-2 nail-biter and gave Chicoutimi real life in the dying minutes.
Shots on goal in the third period were 13-3 for Chicoutimi. Chicoutimi outshot Kitchener 28-18 in the game.
Christian Kirsch made 26 saves on the 28 shots that he faced for the win for Kitchener. For Chicoutimi Lucas Beckman made 15 saves on the 18 shots that he faced.
Player of the game was Dylan Edwards of the Kitchener Rangers
The Next Memorial Cup game is Wednesday May 27th between Everett Silvertips vs Kelowna Rockets
