Friday night at the Arena, the Royals returned home from a 1-0-1 road trip to host the Trois-Rivieres Lions for TR's final two visits of the regular season. The club was bolstered during the week with the reassignment of Matt Brown and Keith Petruzzelli from the AHL Phantoms plus the long-awaited return of fan-favorite Yvan Mongo from a long-term injury absence. This was our annual "kids takeover" night, youngsters applied to be a part of the game staff and for the first time I had one assigned to me. A young man named Declan (age 10) worked with me as the "Jr. PA Announcer", his sister Savannah (she's seven) assisted our in-arena host Mike Keller. In the pregame Declan introduced our starting lineup, during the game he did the initial read on goals and penalties and I followed him on the repeat read. He was a little hesitant at first but once he got comfortable there was no stopping him, on the whole it couldn't have worked out much better. In the game itself the Royals trailed 1-0 in the first period before Matt Brown tied it, two goals by TR gave the visitors a 3-1 lead entering the third period. Three minutes into the period Yvan Mongo lit the lamp to make it a one-goal game, twenty-one seconds later it was that man Mongo once again to tie it 3-3. In the final four minutes TR took the lead back on a goalmouth deflection, an empty-netter with three seconds left nailed down a 5-3 Trois-Rivieres win. Right back at it on Saturday night in game #2, this was "St. Hattricks Night" where a lucky fan could win $10,000 if their preselected player scored three goals. On this night the Royals as a unit did not score three goals but what they did was good enough. Mason Primeau gave the Royals the lead nine minutes into the first period, after TR tied it Brock Caufield scored on an offensive-zone steal just over a minute later for a 2-1 lead. For the last forty-four minutes there was no further scoring, the Royals split the weekend with a tough-as-nails 2-1 victory. Keith Petruzzelli was in goal both nights, on Friday he deserved a better fate and on Saturday he got it. The club's mark is 26-23-10, 12-9-7 at home, the next action is on the Friday the 21st when the Norfolk Admirals visit for a three-in-three weekend. Take care, thanks for reading
