Matthew Welsh earned a 21-save shutout in his 200th Quebec Major Junior Hockey League game Friday for the Charlottetown Islanders.
Liam Peyton scored twice, including the winner, as the Isles defeated the Halifax Mooseheads 5-0 in Welsh’s hometown of Halifax.
Kevin Gursoy, Brett Budgell and Cole Edwards also scored in the victory. Captain Brendon Clavelle had two assists while singles went to Anthony Hamel, Oscar Plandowski, Justin Gill, Cedric Desruisseaux, Drew Johnston and Lukas Cormier.
Alexis Gravel stopped 27 shots in the loss.
Charlottetown held 1-0 and 4-0 period leads.
The Islanders went 0-for-2 on the power play and killed all five of the home side’s chances with the man advantage. Charlottetown also won 41 of the 63 faceoffs (65 per cent).
The Islanders improved to 19-12-4-0 while the Herd is 15-14-2-1. Charlottetown hosts the Cape Breton Eagles (17-13-1-1) Saturday at 7 p.m. in its final game before the Christmas break. Cape Breton lost 4-0 to Moncton (23-9-0-0) on Friday.
Welsh now has 13 career shutouts and is tied with Christopher Gibson (Chicoutimi), Zachary Fucale (Halifax/Quebec) and Adam Russo (Acadie-Bathurst) for seventh in league history.
Philippe Cadorettte, who played for Baie-Comeau and Shawinigan from 2012-16, holds the record with 17. Former P.E.I. Rocket Ryan Mior is tied for third with 15.
Welsh is fifth all time in minutes played with 11,725:12 behind Mior’s record-holding 12,933:20. Mior also played the most games with 239. Welsh is seventh all time in wins while Jacques Cloutier leads with 142.
