Things are definitely heating up as the weeks in February roll by. Battles at the top are getting tighter, especially in the UCHC, SUNYAC, CNE and MASCAC at both the top as well as contests for playoff position further down the standings. The NE-10 has their regular season champion (St. Anselm) confirmed with one remaining week on the schedule, but they and the MAC may be the only ones where there is enough of a gap and too few games remaining to matter to take the top sot away from Wilkes. Some ranked teams struggled this week including Utica, Hamilton, and Endicott who saw their weekends blemished by ties and both a tie and a loss for the Continentals. The excitement is going to continue right to the final horn – here is the weekend roundup in the east:
CNE
The battle for seeding is red hot as just three points separate Curry at the top from second place, University of New England and Endicott lurking four points further in arrears. The real battle is for the remaining playoff positions of third place through sixth where the gap is five points among Suffolk, Johnson & Wales, Nichols, and Wentworth. This weekend certainly tightened things up.
Curry extended their win streak to eleven games with back-to-back shutouts over Wentworth. Karim Gayfullin’s second period goal was all Shane Soderwall needed in a 1-0 win over the Leopards on Friday and the Colonels extended their shutout streak on Saturday with a 4-0 victory. Three first period goals got the Colonels off and running while Jon Kopack and Soderwall split the shutout with a total of fifteen saves.
UNE kept pace with a pair of shutout wins as well over Johnson & Wales by scores of 3-0 and 7-0. Nathan Chickering figured in all the goals on Friday, scoring twice and assisting on Juraj Elias’s goal to open the scoring in the first period. Joey Stanizzi stopped eighteen Wildcat attempts for the shutout win on the road. Back home on Saturday, the Nor’easters opened up the offense with Ryan Kuzmich scoring two goals and Dominic Murphy chipping in with three assists in the lopsided win. Stefan Carney picked up the shutout stopping twenty-six shots.
Endicott earned a win and an overtime tie with Nichols to drop a point in the standings versus the frontrunners. Domenic Garrozzo paced the offense for the Gulls on Friday scoring a hat trick in an 8-2 rout of the Bison. Ryan Willett also had a three-point night scoring one goal and adding two assists. On Saturday, the Bison were far more aggressive on their home ice peppering Gulls goaltender Ryan Wilson with forty-four shots. Nathan Carl gave the home team a 1-0 lead with a shorthanded tally in the third period, but Jack Costanzo netted the game-tying goal with just 58 seconds remaining in regulation for the 1-1 draw. The Gulls took the shootout for the extra point following the scoreless overtime.
This upcoming weekend sees single games between all three league leaders that should make the race even more exciting as Curry hosts Endicott on Friday before traveling to face UNE on Saturday.
MAC
Wilkes has a comfortable lead over second place Stevenson, but Arcadia and Neumann are tied with twenty-eight points and Alvernia sits just four points back in a race for home-ice seeding.
While Wilkes downed Lebanon Valley, 3-1 and Stevenson defeated Misericordia, 6-2, Neumann picked up a big win over Arcadia on Friday night. In the battle of the Knights, the home team Arcadia Knights took a 2-0 lead before Neumann scored three unanswered goals in the second period, including two by Zack Smith for what proved to be the final scoring in a 3-2 road win. Goaltender Cole DeFazio stopped thirty-nine shots including fifteen in each of the second and third periods to backstop the Neumann comeback win.
Arcadia dropped another one-goal game to Wilkes on Saturday, 2-1 while Alvernia tightened things up winning on Friday against King’s and Saturday over Misericordia. On Friday, the Golden Wolves overcame a hat trick from the Monarchs’ Ethan Hersant as Justin Pare scored two goals and added three assists for Alvernia in a 7-3 win. On Saturday, a four-goal third period helped break a 3-3 tie for a 6-3 win over the Cougars. Frazer Dodd paced the attack with two goals while Will White and Lucas Ochitwa each chipped in with two assists.
MASCAC
While weather interfered with games scheduled for Thursday, Plymouth State won the contest played on Thursday and downed Rivier on Saturday for a seven-point lead over Anna Maria who has two games in hand. The real battle is behind third place Salem State where fourth place Worcester State is just three points ahead of seventh place Massachusetts-Dartmouth in what should be a wild race to the finish line.
Worcester State helped themselves out with a big 5-2 win over the Corsairs on Saturday which extended their win streak to four games. Shane Prifrel’s second goal of the game gave the Lancers a 3-1 lead early in the third period, but Hunter Scanlon halved the deficit for UMass-Dartmouth with over thirteen minutes still to play in regulation. Empty-net goals from Brian Clougherty and Anders Groongstad in the final ninety seconds sealed the 5-2 win. Goaltender Wyatt Friedlander stopped 33 of 35 shots to earn the win.
MCLA was riding a two-game win streak after last week’s OT win over Fitchburg and Friday’s 4-0 win over Rivier where goaltender Matthew Gover made thirty-seven saves in a 4-0 win over the Raiders. On Saturday, Anna Maria ended the trailblazers streak with an 8-3 win where the AmCats saw eight different goal scorers and four power play markers pace the attack.
NE-10
St. Anselm hosted St. Michael’s over the weekend with an opportunity to clinch the top seed and regular season title and accomplished both with two wins by 4-2 and 5-3 scores. On Friday, a three goal second period erased a 2-0 deficit to the Purple Knights and Hunter Brackett padded the margin in the third period for the final two-goal margin. On Saturday, the big line of Alberti, Burum and Brackett got going early with all three scoring to help the Hawks to a 3-0 lead. The Purple Knights closed the gap to one goal in the second period but third period goals from Steve Armstrong and Will Van der Veen sealed the 5-3 win.
SNHU jumped ahead of St. Michael’s in the standings with a win and an overtime tie (with shootout win) over Franklin Pierce over the weekend. On Friday, the Penmen rallied from a 2-0 hole against the Ravens with Brendan Lynch scoring one goal and assisting on three others in a 4-2 win. On Saturday, the resilient Penmen again found ways to rally from deficits of 2-1, 4-2, and 5-4 before earning a 5-5 OT tie on Kurt Watson’s third period score.
Earlier in the week the Ravens broke the ice for their first win of the season when they downed a struggling Assumption squad, 6-3. Austin Pick had a five-point game with a goal and four assists to pace the Ravens. Assumption then lost to Post in overtime on Friday as two goals, the second in OT, from Joe Santoro erased a one-goal lead for the Greyhounds in a 2-1 Eagles win. Goaltender Benjamin Cunneen stopped forty-four shots to earn the win.
NEHC
While Hobart is comfortably atop the conference standings and Babson has created some space in second place, there is a logjam of teams between third place and eighth place that are separated by just seven points including third-place Salve Regina being just three points in front of sixth place New England College.
New England College, winners of seven of their last eight, have found their game at the right time of the season. They continued their hot play by taking a two-game series from Elmira over the weekend. Friday night’s contest saw the Pilgrims take advantage of two power play goals to grab a 4-2 win over the Soaring Eagles. Jack Herron paced the attack with two goals and an assist for NEC. Saturday’s re-match was a playoff style atmosphere with both teams exchanging man advantage goals in the first period for all the scoring until Gunnar Sibley scored shorthanded to give the Pilgrims a 2-1 win.
Babson swept a two-game series from Massachusetts-Boston with 4-2 scores in both games. John McElaney led the Beavers offense on Friday with two -goals and Egan Schmitt iced the contest with an empty-net goal. On Saturday, the Beavers scored three times in the third period to erase a one-goal deficit in a second 4-2 win. Will Holland scored the game-winning goal late in the third period and Wyatt George added a more comfortable margin with his tally in the final two minutes of regulation.
Skidmore is yet another team that has found a winning formula in the past couple of weeks as the Thoroughbreds extended their win streak to four games with two wins over Albertus Magnus. Cooper Rice and Mitchell Floccare scored second period goals to break a 1-1 tie in Skidmore’s 4-1 win over the Falcons on Friday. On Saturday, the score was the same, but it was a fast start for the Thoroughbreds that determined the outcome early. Goals by Stephen Perez, Coleman Jenkins, and Ethan Heidepriem in just over a five-minute span in the opening period was more than enough to pace a 4-1 win for Skidmore.
NESCAC
Maybe no other conference has the volatility that one weekend’s results can bring to the standings like NESCAC. This week saw the gap at the top close between Hamilton and Trinity to just three points while third place to tenth place is just a ten-point gap with two weekends of action remaining for playoff eligibility and seeding.
Bowdoin jumped into third place with a strong weekend where they defeated Hamilton and tied Amherst. On Friday, goals were in abundance as the Polar Bears took advantage of two goals and two assists from Gabe Shipper in a 7-5 road win over the Continentals. Defense was a bit tighter on Saturday as Bowdoin and Amherst managed just one marker apiece and Polar Bar netminder Jacob Osbourne doing yeoman’s work with fifty saves to preserve the OT tie.
Trinity tightened the gap to Hamilton with wins over Middlebury and Williams over the weekend. On Friday, the Bantams needed goals by Eamon Doheny and Richard Boysen in the third period to break a 2-2 tie and post a 4-2 win over the Panthers. On Saturday, the Ephs took a 3-1 lead only to see Trinity battle back for a 4-3 advantage in the third period. Owen Stadheim tied the game with just fifteen seconds remaining in regulation to send the game to overtime tied at 4-4. In the extra session Doheny gave Trinity the sudden victory with just twenty seconds remaining in the overtime period, 5-4.
SUNYAC
The standings in SUNYAC are set for some serious scoreboard watching as while Cortland has clinched a playoff spot, that is the only known for all the teams competing to earn a post-season berth. Just four points separate the top three teams while one point is the margin between fourth and seventh place.
Potsdam kept their playoff hopes alive when they ended Cortland’s four game win streak on Friday night. The Bears took advantage of two goals by Mason Hoehn to break a 1-1 tie and Jakub Hall added some margin late in the third period for a big 4-2 road win over the Red Dragons. Potsdam completed their weekend action with a comfortable 5-1 win over Morrisville to stay in the playoff mix.
Cortland rebounded on Saturday against Plattsburgh with a decisive 6-2 win at home. Two goals from Domenic Settimo and a goal and two assists from Colby Seitz helped the Red Dragons to a 4-0 advantage in route to the victory over the Cardinals.
After dropping a 4-3 contest to Canton, Buffalo State rallied to down Oswego on Saturday with two goals in the final period breaking a 2-2 tie in a 4-2 win over the Lakers. Don Powell and Connor Bizal provided the decisive markers for the Bengals.
Canton completed their victorious tour of western New York with a 2-1 overtime win over Fredonia on Saturday. Evan Pringle scored less than a minute into overtime to give the Kangaroos a hard-fought road win over the Blue Devils.
UCHC
The battle is still at the top with Geneseo and Utica battling for the top seed and games against each other still on the calendar this coming weekend.
Geneseo took a pair of wins over former SUNYAC opponent Brockport over the weekend. On Friday, two goals and an assist from Zach Purcell helped pace a 7-2 Knights victory over the Golden Eagles. Saturday’s contest saw Robert Gatewood record a hat trick in Geneseo’s 5-2 win against Brockport. Goaltender Jacob Torgner made seventeen saves in the win.
The Utica Pioneers faced a far more determined opponent as Friday’s matchup with Chatham was a very physical and penalty filled affair. Utica took a 3-1 lead into the third period only to see Zack Conner and Nick Cyprian score in the final eight minutes to tie the score at 3-3. Overtime could not decide a winner and the Cougars took the shootout (2-0). On Saturday, Utica took advantage of two goals from Drake Morse and two-point games from Johnny Mulera and Eric Vitale in a 6-2 win.
Manhattanville picked up a pair of one-goal wins against Nazareth over the weekend by 3-2 and 4-3 scores. Nicholas Rogers scored two goals and Elijah Devereaux added one as the Valiants built a 3-0 lead and held on for a 3-2 win. Saturday’s game saw the Valiants rally with Devereaux netting the game-tying goal with just six seconds remaining in the third period and Artem Mateichenko score the game-winner in overtime for the 4-3 win over the Golden Flyers.
Three Biscuits
Austin Pick – Franklin Pierce – scored one goal and assisted on three more for the Ravens who earned their first victory of the season over Assumption on Tuesday night with a 6-3 win.
Domenic Garrozzo – Endicott – scored a hat trick in the Gulls dominating 8-2 win over Nichols on Friday night.
Will McEvoy – Connecticut College – stopped forty-one Jumbo attempts on goal in a 1-0 win for the Camels over their travel partner on Friday night.
There are just one or two weekends left for teams to make their move and kick their level of play into high gear. This weekend showed that even the frontrunners can be surprised and that sets up some very juicy storylines coming down the stretch in February. Lots to watch in person and other scores on your phone as there will still be a lot of movement coming soon in league standings across the region.
