ROUEN, France – The Rouen Dragons won their tenth French title as the trophy of the Ligue Magnus returned to the Normandy city.

After winning the regular season ahead of Briançon Diables Rouges with the same numbers of points, the Dragons also won a close final series, this time against the Angers Ducs who have never played in the final before.

Rouen made the finals without a single loss in the post-season, sweeping Chamonix Chamois in the quarterfinals and title-holder Grenoble Brûleurs de Loups 3-0.

While Rouen had a clean record, Briançon lost to Angers in the other semi-final in five games.

The final series went the full distance of five games which hasn’t happened since the new Ligue Magnus was introduced in 2004.

Angers surprised Rouen winning the first two games on the road, but when the series went over to Angers,  things changed rapidly.

Rouen opened the scoring with two goals after three minutes and won 4-2. In the second game in Angers, Rouen won 6-1.

It all came down to Game 5 in Rouen where the rink was sold out with 2,747 fans. After a scoreless first period and a 1-1 deadlock after the second, Rouen scored two goals in as many minutes by Luc Tardif at 48:36 and Jonathan Zwikel at 50:35. Angers cut the lead to one, but an empty netter sealed the win and the championship for Rouen.

Rouen’s Carl Mallette was the playoff top scorer with 13 goals and 9 assists in 11 games – two more than Angers’ Jonathan Bellemare, who was the top scorer of the regular season.