MONCTON, N.B. — Mika Cyr’s goal with two minutes to play in the third period was the difference as the Moncton Wildcats downed the Cape Breton Eagles 2-1 at the Avenir Centre on Wednesday.
Christian Huntley also found the back of the net for the Wildcats (6-2-0-0).
Egor Sokolov had the lone goal for the Eagles (6-2-0-0).
Olivier Rodrigue made 29 saves for Moncton. William Grimard turned aside 33 of 25 shots for Cape Breton.
After a scoreless first period, the Wildcats opened the scoring with Huntley netting his third goal of the season on the power play at 1:59 of the second frame.
Cape Breton answered at 7:43 of the third period with Sokolov netting his eighth goal of the season.
Cyr gave the Wildcats the lead and never looked back at 18:00 on a goal assisted by Jordan Spence and Jeremy McKenna, who returned to the team’s lineup after attending the Calgary Flames camp.
The Eagles were without forwards Derek Gentile, Cole Fraser and Mathias Laferrière.
Gentile missed the game with what Cape Breton coach Jake Grimes describes as "a couple of ailing, day-to-day-type injuries."
Meanwhile, Cole Fraser is listed as day-to-day with what the team is calling an upper-body injury. As for Laferrière, he remains out with an upper-body injury, but returned to the ice for practice earlier this week.
Moncton outshot Cape Breton 35-30, while going 1-for-2 on the power play. As for Cape Breton, they went 0-for-4 with the man-advantage.
The Eagles will return to action on Saturday when they host the Val-d'Or Foreurs. Game time is 7 p.m. at Centre 200 in Sydney.
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