Bullfrogs Have No Trouble Advancing to Title Game

The Bullfrogs’ “Run-it-up Tour” went international Tuesday with a league-record 35-point margin of victory.

The Bullfrogs, not content with blowing out opponents from the contiguous 48 states, advanced to tonight’s Major League Roller Hockey championship by beating the United Kingdom Division winner in the league semifinals.

The Bullfrogs defeated Brighton, 37-2, in front of of about 2,000 at the Arrowhead Pond.

The Bullfrogs (21-0-1) will play for the championship tonight at the Pond against Orlando, a 5-4 winner over Columbus in the other semifinal. The Surge is 20-1-1.

The final should be more competitive than the Bullfrogs’ victory over Brighton. Orlando, which split regular-season games with the Bullfrogs, won a shootout, 9-8, in the season finale.

“It will be a good battle to play Orlando,” said Rob Laurie, the Bullfrogs’ goalie who faced only 12 shots. “We won one shootout and lost another shootout. It will be pretty even.

“It will be nice to settle it in a rubber match.”

The Bullfrogs, who had a 67-12 shot advantage, will get their chance after dismantling the Tigers (7-4).

The Bullfrogs just missed the league record for goals (Washington, 38), but demolished the Bullfrogs’ team record for goals (25), breaking it with 6 minutes 13 seconds left in the third quarter.

Glenn Stewart (seven goals, six assists), John Hanson (five goals, eight assists) and Kevin St. Jacques (five goals, eight assists) broke the team’s single-game scoring record, and Bill Lund (two goals, eight assists) tied Sandy Gasseau’s record from earlier this season.

Lund, Hanson and St. Jacques broke the team’s single-game record for assists (Victor Gervais, Darren Perkins, seven, 1995); Perkins also had seven assists. Stewart tied Brad McCaughey’s record for goals in a game (seven, 1994).

The Bullfrogs took a 10-1 lead in the first quarter, had a 20-3 shot advantage, and had the Tigers bringing in their backup goalie to share the punishment.

The game’s turning point--if such mismatches actually have turning points--came shortly after Brighton’s first goal, a four-on-two power play that cut the deficit to 3-1. The Bullfrogs scored five goals in a 98-second span, getting two from Stewart and one each from B.J. MacPherson, St. Jacques and Hanson.

That made it 8-1. All that was left was running out the game’s remaining 39 minutes.

Hanson had eight points by halftime and Lund had seven.

The MLRH record for points came in Virginia’s 38-6 victory over Philadelphia in which Hugo Belanger had 11 goals and 15 assists.

The Bullfrogs were coming off a 20-4 playoff victory over Washington.

It was so bad Tuesday, Bullfrog fans cheered in the first half when the Tigers actually checked a Bullfrog player to the floor.

When defenseman Chad Wagner was penalized, then pushed one of the Tigers into the boards after the play--usually the kind of action eliciting an inspired response from the crowd--it took on the appearance of being pathetic. The fans, apparently unlike Wagner, realized the score was 16-2 at the time.