The Columbus Blue Jacket’s and St. Louis Blues faced off for the final game of the tournament to determine who would be the champions of the week. The Blue Jacket’s Pascal Leclaire and the Blues’ Phil Osaer were the goalies for the night.
The first action to make the score sheets were penalties. Three were handed out three minutes and twenty-one seconds into the game. Simon Skoog of the Blues was sent to the box for roughing. St. Louis’ Mahon and Columbus’ Tyler Sloan each received five minute fighting majors. Sloan got a few good punches in with Mahon only punching him once to the back of the head. Sloan was worn out at the end of a shift though and went down fairly easily when Mahon wrestled him to the ice.
With Columbus already on the power play Brett Scheffelmaier got a delay of game call giving the Blue Jackets a five-on-three advantage for thirty-nine seconds. Four seconds after St. Louis was allowed to have one of their men back on the ice Columbus’ Preston Mizzi received the puck from Kiel McLeod and lifted it over Osaer’s left shoulder.
Eleven minutes and fifty-four seconds into the period Ben Knopp was called for tripping giving St. Louis a power play. Eight seconds into the power play Greg Davis scored for St. Louis with an assist from Brad Voth.
Mizzi went to the penalty box for holding giving St. Louis another power play opportunity with five minutes and one second remaining in the first period. Half way through the power play the Blues scored with a goal from Gove that was low on the glove side.
Columbus scored two more goals in the first period. The first one came from Ryan Bowness as he was just coming off the bench with three minutes left in the period and stole the puck at St. Louis’ blue line. The second came with a minute and forty-three seconds left in the period. Kiel McLeod passed the puck back to Scott Heffeman on the blue line who took a slap-shot and scored.
St. Louis scored three goals in the second period, the first and third coming from Blake Evans and the second from Gove. Cory Pecker scored six minutes into the third period with assists from Greg Davis and Jay McClement.
With four minutes and forty-seven seconds remaining in the game Scheffelmaier was sent to the penalty box for tripping giving Columbus a power play. Bowness scored his second of the night with an assist from Aaron Johnson twenty-three seconds into the power play.
Mizzi then scored his second of the night with a minute and thirty-eight seconds remaining to bring Columbus within one point of St. Louis. Columbus pulled Leclaire but they were unable to score and Jeff Panzer stole the puck at Columbus’ blue line and shot it into the empty net with twenty-four and a half seconds remaining.
St. Louis has now won the championship game of the prospect tournament two years in a row, both times against a team that hadn’t yet lost a game in the tournament.
Detroit vs. Atlanta
For the second time this week Detroit started out with a good first period gaining a three to nothing lead only to lose the game, this time in overtime. It didn’t take long for Detroit to get on the score board, just forty seconds into the game Mike Williams put the puck past Atlanta’s goaltender Mike Garnett.
Simon Gamache tried to slip the puck in between Drew MacIntyre and the left goal post four and a half minutes into the period. MacIntyre was able to get his glove down just in time though to rob Gamache of a goal.
Three minutes later Ryan Barnes took a shot on Garnett who stopped the puck but Detroit’s Harlan Anderson picked up the rebound and lifted the puck over Garnett’s right shoulder.
Chad LaRose brought his goal total for the week to four goals in four games with six minutes and forty-two seconds left in the first period. The assists came from Pavel Datsyuk, who had four assists this week, and Greg Jacina.
Thirty-eight seconds after scoring the goal LaRose went to the penalty box for slashing, putting Atlanta on the power play for two minutes. Half way through the power play Gamache scored with assists from Dany Heatly and Ilja Kovalchuk.
LaRose had only been out of the penalty box for thirty-eight seconds when he took offense to Carl Mallette’s cross-check. They had a little wrestling match, that ended with the 6 foot, 198 lbs. Mallette on top of the 5-foot-10, 170 lbs. LaRose.
There weren’t any goals scored in the second period but half way through Garnett was replaced in net by Jeremy Day. Heatly scored an unassisted goal over MacIntyre’s left shoulder a minute and fifty-six seconds into the third period.
With twenty-eight seconds left Heatly scored again tying the game, sending it to a five minute overtime period. The overtime period was played four-on-four and was end-to-end action. After a few chances for both teams and only thirty seconds left in overtime Karl Stewart lifted the puck over MacIntyre with an assist from Heatly. Heatly was involved in every goal scored for Atlanta.
Detroit finished with last place in the 2001 Prospect Tournament in Traverse City, MI with a 3-1 record. Atlanta finished at fifth place with a 2-2 record.
Nashville vs. Minnesota
The Nashville Predators placed third in the tournament with a five-to-three win over the Minnesota Wild. Martin Erat scored two goals for Nashville. The other three goals came from Eric Lavigne, Randy Ponte, and Konstantin Panov. Stephan Veilleux scored the first goal for Minnesota with the second and third goal being scored by Vernon Fidder.
