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Brazeau breaks franchise single-season goal scoring record in one sided loss

"It would be scary to think of where we would be without a Justin Brazeau'
20190224 battalion knights
Justin Brazeau one of the lone bright spots for the Battalion in a 8-1 drubbing at the hands of the London Knights. Photo by Sean Ryan.

Matt Duchene. Cody Hodgson. Wojtek Wolski. Raffi Torres. Jay McClement. Mike Amadio. Barclay Goodrow.

All prolific goal scorers in their Major Junior careers while playing for the Battalion franchise.

None had been able to do what Justin Brazeau did in the first period of Sunday’s game against the London Knights; score 51 goals in a single season. The lone goal in an 8-1 loss to the London Knights on Sunday afternoon.

One night after tying Mike Amadio’s franchise record of 50, the New Liskeard native Brazeau cemented his name as the only player to ever reach 51.

“It’s pretty cool, especially when you see all the names that have played for this franchise,” Brazeau says of his accomplishment.

He says going into the season he had his sights set on reach the half-century mark.

“At the beginning of the year my goal was 50,” he said. 

“I thought to myself if I was able to get it, great. But if I didn’t I was going to try and finish near it. But that was the goal and I’m happy to have achieved it.”

And somehow, for some reason, the captain of the Battalion, who has shown he can do everything a coach could ask of a player, has not yet been signed to an NHL contract.

It remains as one of the biggest mysteries of the season as to why none of the 31 NHL teams hasn’t inked a kid who has done nothing but improve year over year and consistently dominates almost every time he’s on the ice.

Brazeau says by surpassing the 50 goal mark it shows that he has learned how to adapt and continue to get stronger as a player every year. He says “I feel like my skating’s improved to a point where it’s not that much of a deficiency anymore. I know it has to get better to play at the next level but if I’m getting better every single year, and working hard, good things will happen.”

On top of the 51 goals, Brazeau now also has 94 points.

“Players like Brazeau don’t come around too often," noted Battalion assistant coach Scott Wray

"He’s a consummate professional. He’s out after practice shooting and working on his trade, he’s a very hard-working kid, and he’s very humble, you wouldn’t even know that he has over 10 goals, let alone over 50 goals. That’s the type of guy you’re dealing with.”

Wray added, “it would be scary to think of where we would be without a Justin Brazeau.”

On Sunday afternoon against the London Knights, without Brazeau the Battalion may have left Budweiser Gardens without getting a single goal.

It was a hard fought opening 20 minutes, in which the Knights put two pucks past Christian Purboo, who was getting his first start since a 4-3 overtime win against Sault Ste. Marie on February 14.

Antonio Stranges (12) got the opening tally at 8:06. Four minutes later, Brazeau made history on a four on three power play, netting his 51st of the season, blasting a puck from just below the left side face-off circle and tying the game 1-1.

Kevin Hancock (48) would score on the power play at 19:31 of the first, and despite trailing the Knights, Wray says the team felt pretty good going into the locker room.

“I thought we hung in there pretty good for the first period…but they all of a sudden got a couple more power plays than us in the second and the boys got a little tired running around killing penalties,” said Wray.  

It’s also the sixth game in the last 10 days for a North Bay team that was dealing with a couple of key injuries and were on the last leg of a three games in three days road swing.

Wray says despite the calls getting evened out at the end of the game, the damage was done in a second period that saw the Knights score four times, pushing their lead to 6-1 after 40 minutes.

At 5:48 Evan Bouchard (10) made it 3-1. Then Alex Formenton (11) scored a power-play goal at 10:35. Two more goals came just three minutes later with Josh Nelson (17) and Liam Foudy (32) getting on the score sheet.

The Battalion will face just one more Western Conference opponent this year when they host Owen Sound on Thursday. From that point on its all big games against Eastern foes and Wray says the rest day coming up will be much needed.

Connor McMichael (35) at 4:30 of the third, and Billy Moskal (13) at 13:04 rounded out the scoring on a night when London fired 51 shots on net compared to North Bay’s 23.

North Bay was 1/4 on the power play while London scored twice on their five attempts with the man advantage.


Matt Sookram

About the Author: Matt Sookram

Matthew Sookram is a Canadore College graduate. He has lived and worked in North Bay since 2009 covering different beats; everything from City Council to North Bay Battalion.
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