A dreadful second period spelled disaster for the Manitoba Moose on Tuesday.
The Moose surrendered four second period goals, including three in the span of a little over three minutes, in a 6-2 loss to the Toronto Marlies at Bell MTS Place.
The Marlies defeated the Moose for the second straight night, with two more games between the two sides later in the week.
With no pre-season, the Moose are clearly still working out some of the kinks. The Moose committed countless giveaways, with two turnovers directly contributing to a pair of Marlies’ goals.
“It’s what’s going to happen when you have a young team,” Moose head coach Pascal Vincent said. “It’s one guy making a mistake, and everybody looks bad on the shift, but it’s not really the other four players. It’s just one guy that needs to understand what needs to be done at that moment. So, not getting too high, not getting too low.”
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Kristian Reichel opened the scoring for the Moose a little over four minutes into the game. After the Marlies tied the game, Nathan Todd was in the right place at the right time to make the deposit for his first goal of the season, and the Moose had a one-goal lead after 20 minutes.
But to start the second period, the Marlies scored three goals in the span of just 3:08, and tacked on one more late in the period for a commanding 5-2 lead.
“We just had a couple lapses,” said Todd. “We kinda lost our game for six, seven minutes there, and they capitalized. That’s basically what it came down to.”
Winnipegger Adam Brooks scored the only goal of the final frame to seal the victory.
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Calle Rosen scored two goals for Toronto in the win. Kenny Agostino, Nick Robertson, and Kristians Rubins had the other tallies for the Marlies.
The Moose were outshot 34-28 as Mikhail Berdin made 28 stops.
Manitoba made only one roster change from the season opener with Jeff Malott replacing Cole Maier in the lineup.
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The Moose drop to 0-2 for the season. The same two teams will square off again on Thursday and Friday at Bell MTS Place.