A good lacrosse game has four features. It holds the fan captive from opening faceoff to final buzzer, it's full of great saves, goals are are of highlight variety, and you hardly notice the referees.

By those conditions, Saturday's game between the Ottawa Rebel and Calgary Roughnecks was certainly not a good one. A blowout, packed with officiating stumbles and lackluster goals, was the result, a 20-15 win for the Rebel.

The home crowd leapt for joy 25 seconds into the game with a goal from Kyle Goundrey, but the visitors owned the rest of the first quarter. Before the opening minute ended, Jake Lawson had knotted the game at one, and followed himself up with one 90 seconds later. Rookie Dan Marohl, outstanding all night long, scored his first just past the three-minute mark of the quarter, while 33 seconds later Lawson completed the hat trick.

The Ottawa roll continued along, with goals from Chris Konopliff, Mike Benedict, Ryan Painter, Jamie Roy and Jason Tarbell before the merciful buzzer rang to end the 15 minutes of torture to the Roughneck faithful. The Benedict and Tarbell tallies came on the man advantage.

Rookie Roughneck goaltender Grant MacLeod got his first NLL floor time during the nine-goal Rebel run, allowing two of those scores. Ottawa netminder Matt Disher was playing fantastic as well -- while the offense was scoring nine straight goals, Dish the Fish made ten straight saves to finish off the quarter.

The second quarter opened similarly to the first, with Calgary scoring. Bruce Alexander charged towards the net, then suddenly stopped and backed up, launching a shot over the double Rebel defensemen and a slightly surprised Matt Disher. Goundrey potted his second of the afternoon to continue the Roughneck roll, and John Kilbride made his presence known to cut the Ottawa lead to 9-4. But that was about the time the Rebel took a run of their own. Mike Benedict scored his second, Ryan Painter tallied his second, O'Brien scored and finally Konopliff got his second to make the halftime lead a whopping nine goals. Shots on goal to that point were also largely in favor of the Rebel, 33-25.

Once again, the third quarter started in the home team's, but you could almost feel a difference in the Roughnecks. First off, they got back out onto the floor with nearly two and a half minutes remaining in halftime, when normally they cut the margin much thinner. It only took fourteen seconds from the start of the half for Chris Panos to find the netting behind Disher. The Rebel had an answer for that, as Rory Graham scored to restore the nine-goal lead.

Maybe a rally was inevitable from the Roughnecks but it took a perfect cross-floor pass from Adam Bysouth to get things rolling again. That pass found big Matt Green heading to the net with Andrew Guindon strapped on for the ride. Nothing was stopping that train from getting where he wanted to be, though, and in one motion the goal light was on. Kyle Goundrey took his next opportunity to nail down his hat trick followed by Kaleb Toth scoring shorthanded.

Back came the Rebel with an answer. On the same penalty that Toth scored his goal, Ryan Painter scored one at the other end of the floor. Jake Lawson potted his fourth of the night followed by a bouncer from Dan Marohl with a couple Roughies in the sin bin.

This brought the referees into the question. All night they had forced us to endure a variety of conferences regarding calls, but on this goal they took center stage. With two Roughnecks in the box the discussion began on which should be released and which should stay put. After sending Ryan Campbell back out onto the floor they resumed play but upon the first dead ball situation they reversed that call and opened the gate for Jason Wulder to go out and Ryan Campbell to come back in.

Matt Green took a Bruce Alexander feed to end the quarter and get the Roughnecks confidence back even if just a little bit.

The final quarter started as a Roughneck nightmare and a Rebel dream. Already sitting with a large and comfortable lead, the Ottawa squad took the offense down the floor and got some goals. First it was Tarbell and his second tally of the game, then it was Ryan Painter with his fourth. O'Brien came crashing towards the net to score his second of the afternoon and set up a stunning eleven-goal lead for the visitors.

Chris Konopliff, though, was nailed with a two-minute visit to the sin bin and Benny Prepchuk woke up about the same time. Prepchuk finished off a passing play from Panos and Goundrey to get the power play goal. With 5:26 left on the clock, Grant MacLeod jumped over the boards to replace Matt King a second and final time. Then it was Panos and Prepchuk hooking up again just with Panos finishing the play for his second. Kaleb Toth continued the late rally before Panos completed his hat trick bid.

The next trip down the floor saw the Roughies called for a moving pick and after the whistle blew the play dead, Doug Hill buried his cross check into Jesse Phillips' back. Quickly, a yard sale situation occurred, with gloves, helmets and sticks flying to the side as Phillips pounded, then jersey'ed Hill. Words were said all around and finally Ryan Painter said the magic phrase that earned him a whooping. Rob Desormeaux took offense, then took care of things, pulling the helmet off of Painter's head, without undoing the straps, then rained down the haymakers.

After that was sorted out, Andrew Guindon felt left out and had more choice words for the "Xman" before getting his own butt kicked along the boards. So the strangest set of penalties was called and all five were sent to the showers. Desormeaux had the pleasure of receiving two five-minute majors for fighting on the same play.

Following nearly ten minutes of conversation, discussion, translation, a piece of paper and a pencil to decide what to do next they played some more lacrosse. Grant MacLeod showed off his long passing skills with two perfect strikes in the final minute. The first time, the play found Shawn Cable open while the second hit Kaleb Toth in stride for his hat trick with only seven seconds remaining.

Next up for the 4-9 Roughnecks is a trip to Toronto on Saturday, 23 February. Ottawa, 2-8, hosts that same Rock team a week from today at Corel Centre.

BOX SUMMARY
                                      1  2  3  4     TOT
Ottawa Rebel (2-8)                    9  4  4  3  --  20
Calgary Roughnecks (4-9)              1  3  5  6  --  15

OTTAWA REBEL                  CALGARY ROUGHNECKS
               G - A   PTS                   G - A   PTS
Painter        4 - 5     9    K Goundrey     3 - 3     6
Lawson         4 - 4     8    Toth           3 - 2     5
Konopliff      2 - 6     8    Panos          3 - 1     4
Benedict       2 - 2     4    Prepchuk       1 - 3     4
Marohl         2 - 3     5    Cable          1 - 2     3
Roy            1 - 3     4    J Phillips     0 - 3     3
Evans          0 - 4     4    Green          2 - 0     2
O'Brien        2 - 1     3    B Alexander    1 - 1     2
Tarbell        2 - 1     3    Bysouth        0 - 2     2
Laverty        0 - 3     3    MacLeod        0 - 2     2
R Graham       1 - 0     1    Kilbride       1 - 0     1
Disher         0 - 1     1    R Campbell     0 - 1     1
A Guindon      0 - 1     1    Desormeaux     0 - 1     1
Serr           0 - 1     1    King           0 - 1     1
                              Sundher        0 - 1     1

Shots on goal           56    Shots on goal           54
Saves made by (GA)      39    Saves made by (GA)      36
   Disher (15)       39          King (18)         32
                                 MacLeod (2)        4
Penalties               15    Penalties               15
Penalty Minutes         63    Penalty Minutes         55
Power Play Chances       7    Power Play Chances       6
Power Play Goals         5    Power Play Goals         3
   Painter            2          Cable              1
   Benedict           1          K Goundrey         1
   Marohl             1          Prepchuk           1
   Tarbell            1
Shorthanded Goals        0    Shorthanded Goals        2
   (None)                        Green              1
                                 Toth               1
Loose Balls             66    Loose Balls             61
   Roy               10          Prepchuk           7
   Disher             9          K Goundrey         6
   Serr               8          Toth               6
                                 Wulder             6
Faceoffs Won            18    Faceoffs Won            21
   R Graham     (18-20)          Sundher      (14-10)
   Tasse        ( 0- 1)          Katanchik    ( 7- 8)

*** STATS OFFICIAL BY VERIFY WITH CALGARY ROUGHNECKS ***