This brawl is from the 2000-2001 season. As LaLa said, back then the teams always played a home-and-home during the holidays. Usually Dec 30 in Cape Breton, and New Year's Day in Halifax. The New Years game in Halifax was always a beauty. Usually a sellout crowd of 10,000..... 1,000 or more of those being Cape Bretoners who made the drive up that morning (many hungover from the night before!)........ and the New Years game in Halifax always felt like more than just another regular season game. It was an annual event with provincial pride on the line, and the game was always close and intense, even in years where the Moose were way better than us.
Anyway, this pre-game brawl happened before the Dec 30 game at C200. As LaLa said, Nick Greenough always wanted to be last off for Halifax. And Hunter Lahache was always last off for us. This time, neither would budge. They ended up chirping each other for several minutes. Then on the video, you see Greenough say something that apparently makes Lahache snap. Lahache throws one, and it's on.
It was indeed Jules-Edy Laraque who was the first extra guy out there. It was a long-held matter of debate; Halifax fans insisted he was only out there to play peacemaker (he's actually keeping the peace as a cop in Halifax now!), CB fans felt his intentions weren't so innocent.
Then after a few seconds of two Moose on the ice and one Eagle, Ryan Flinn gleefully came thru the gate and started wailing away badly on both Halifax players, especially Greenough. Flinn was a monster in the Q, lost very few fights, and usually ate his opponent for lunch. He was big, tough, and quite mean.
Then completely unrelated to anything else, Jonathan Boone of Halifax wanders on the ice in half-gear. Immediately, George Davis of the Eagles comes after him, also in half-gear, and they go. What a goon squad we had - we had Lahache (400+ PIMS that year), Flinn (arguable heavyweight champ of the Q for 2000-2001), and Davis (animal in training, would be top 3 among Q heavies the following season) all on the same team.
Part of the backstory dates back to Halifax's camp that August. Their last overage spot came down to a training camp battle between Ryan Flinn and Nick Greenough, both tough guys who could score the odd goal too. Greenough ended up being chosen, and apparently Flinn was very pissed about the decision. Later that fall, Flinn was traded to Cape Breton (or we picked him up on waivers, can't remember).
This Dec 30 game might have been the first CB-Halifax game with both those guys in the lineup, and it was no secret Flinn wanted to even the score for Greenough taking his overage spot. That's why he came out and so happily pounded on Greenough in that brawl..... and the two also fought in the first period of the New Year's Day game. Suspensions hadn't been handed out yet, so all the brawl participants played, and boy did that make things intense. The two fought their first shift on the ice together, and Flinn got the final word. Greenough dislocated his shoulder during the fight, which led to him getting pummeled pretty badly, and actually he ended up never playing another game for the Moose. Can't remember if they replaced him with another overager, or if his shoulder just didn't heal.
That New Year's Day game was awesome. There was so much anticipation after what happened in the pregame in CB. For some reason, the players weren't suspended.... but the coaches were. So our GM at the time, Gaetan Larue, took over behind the bench for Pascal Vincent during the game in Halifax. What did he Larue do to set the tone for the bloodthirsty 10,000-strong at the Metro Centre?
He iced a starting lineup that included Hunter Lahache, Ryan Flinn, and George Davis. ;D ;D ;D Each player was met with a huge cascade of boos, but fans of both teams couldn't wait for the puck to drop!
The teams got business out of the way immediately. Three fights in the first few minutes.
First it was Lahache and I believe Hugo Lehoux. Nice spirited heavyweight tilt between two guys who absolutely loved to drop the mitts. Win Lahache - he was one of the league's most feared heavies, while Lehoux was a willing gamer who would take on anyone, but not quite among the Q's elite.
Second was a middleweight bout between Jules-Edy Laraque of Halifax and Eagles captain J-P Cote. Laraque got the better of Cote in this one, despite giving up probably a good 4-5 inches in height.
And finally, the main event, and one Moose fans who'd seen these two play as teammates at the 2000 Memorial Cup really wanted to see. The final word on the training camp overage battle - Greenough vs Flinn. And as stated before, Flinn got his revenge for being beaten out for the 20 spot.
Many fans expected this game to be an utter gong show, and the teams certainly kept the bad blood flowing from the previous game with the three fights in the first few minutes. But after those three scraps, the teams switched to hockey - and nobody minded, because it was a great game. As always, felt like more than just a reg season game. Back-and-forth game that was in doubt till the final two minutes or so, and featured great goaltending at both ends. Current Eagles' goaltending coach Scott Gouthro actually made his Q debut in this one. What a pressure cooker for your first game! Possibly the (regular season) apex of the Battle of Nova Scotia rivalry...... and in front of 10,000 fans. But Gouthro played a great game - 30+ saves to backstop the Eagles to a 5-3 victory. Pascal Leclaire played a strong game in the Moose net himself, including two or three dazzling glove saves in the splits. It was almost kind of a David and Goliath goaltending matchup - Gouthro was a 19-year-old rookie and the Eagles' third goalie, playing his first-ever Q game. Leclaire was arguably the biggest-name goalie in the league, and would be a first round NHL pick that year. But Gouthro came out on top.
Gouthro played because Marc-Andre Fleury was away at the Under-17s, and veteran Daniel Boisclair shat the bed in the Dec 30 game at C200 (a 5-4 Halifax win). Boisclair played so badly that game, that we put in our fourth-string goalie - Neil Logan - for the third period. Not sure why Logan was the backup on Dec 30 and not Scott Gouthro - he may have been committed to play for his Jr A team and regular squad that year, the Halifax Oland Exports. Nevertheless, Gouthro was back for Jan 1 and Boisclair had played so badly on Dec 30 that they decided to roll the dice and start Gouthro.
When the dust finally settled and suspensions were handed out....... Lahache got 10 games, Flinn got 8, and Davis got 5. For the Moose, I think it was something along the lines of Greenough 8, Laraque 6, and Boone 5 (could be wrong on those). Both coaches (Pascal Vincent of CB and Halifax's Shawn MacKenzie) got two games, I believe.
The CB camp was none too happy with the length of the bans to Lahache and Flinn. So they filed an appeal to the Q League (at a cost of a couple thousand dollars if I recall). What was the result of said appeal?
The league INCREASED Lahache's suspension from 10 games to 12, and Flinn's from 8 to 10!!!!!!!! I somehow think if this was the Quebec Remparts or Rimouski Oceanic, that doesn't exactly happen. ;D ;D
And that's pretty much the story of the infamous pregame brawl you found on YouTube.
Over the years it's been replayed countless times on the TVs in the main concourse at C200, before games and during intermissions. It always draws a crowd of curious onlookers - a mix of longtime fans reliving it one more time, and newer fans who were seeing it for the first time. Amongst the chatter, you can often hear the older fans giving the newer fans the rundown of what happened, as they're watching.
It was definitely the regular season peak of the CB-Halifax rivalry. But the best was yet to come, in an epic 2002 playoff series between the two (won by the Eagles, in 6 games) that captured the attention of sports fans all over the province.