Boughner and the Spitfires Ready to Go

(Rimouski, QC) The puck drops for the OHL Champion Windsor Spitfires at the 2009 MasterCard Memorial Cup Saturday afternoon at 4:30 pm when they faceoff against the QMJHL Champion Drummondville Voltigeurs. The game will be broadcast live on Rogers Sportsnet.

The Spitfires arrived in Rimouski Wednesday afternoon and after two full practices Thursday at the Colisee in Rimouski and Friday at a rink in nearby St. Fabien, the team skated this morning with a limited squad and are all set to finally play. "We are anxious to start" said head coach Bob Boughner, "the town is really nice and the people have treated us awesome. The whole town is definitely buzzing about this event."

The Spitfires, who boasted the highest scoring offence in the OHL this season with 311 goals will face another highly skilled team in the Voltigeurs who also led the QMJHL in goals scored with 345. Yannick Riendeau led the league in regular season and playoff scoring. He scored 126 points (58-68) in 64 regular season games and 52 points (29-23) in 19 playoff games. Dmitry Kulikov is their top defender and is ranked 11th by NHL Central Scouting. The Russian-born prospect won a bronze medal with Team Russia at the World Junior Hockey Championships this past winter and also competed at the Home Hardware CHL/NHL Top Prospects Game.

Voltigeurs head coach Guy Boucher led his team to a President Cup win as QMJHL champions capped off with a game seven 2-1 win over the Shawinigan Cataractes Tuesday night.

"We have scouted Drummondville on tape and we watched their game seven win on Tuesday" said Boughner, "we will need to stay out of the penalty box since they have one of the best power plays in the CHL. We expect them to play with lots of emotion in front of their Quebec-based fans. We will just to stick to playing Spitfires hockey."

In the opening game of the 2009 MasterCard Memorial Cup Friday night, the Kelowna Rockets beat the host Rimouski Oceanic 4-1.

For more information please visit www.mastercardmemorialcup.com.

Courtesy Ontario Hockey League