Michigan State freshman Tommy Goebel showed his rookie teammates how to put the puck in the back of the net Sunday afternoon at Munn Arena, as three of the six Spartan goals against the Windsor Lancers belonged to him.
Unfortunately for Goebel, the 6-0 win was only an exhibition, so the natural hat trick doesn’t count toward his season totals. And even though his team dominated play at both ends, Spartan coach Rick Comley was cautious.
“I’m happy that we had a chance to play in a competitive situation,” Comley said. “One thing about playing exhibition games like this, they’re better than intrasquad games but they’re not as good as a regular-season game, and you have to be really, really careful not to read too much into it.”
“It wasn’t what the score was going to be, it’s certain things we wanted to accomplish, which we feel we did over this weekend. So we’re very happy with the game today and happy with what we’ve done over the weekend,” Lancer head coach Dr. Vern Stenlund said. “We were very proud of our kids today; we had three games in three nights, and this was probably our best game.”
Though the Spartans controlled the puck for the majority of the game, the first nine minutes were scoreless.
Early on, a Spartan shot trickled through Lancers goalie Jay Ewasiuk’s legs, blown dead before it crossed the line. A Lancer shot made it through the traffic in front of Spartan goaltender Matt Migliaccio before deflecting off a skate blade in the crease and veering off in another direction.
Then, at 9:02, Jim Slater sped down the left side and made a cross-ice pass to Mike Lalonde, who threw the puck at the net, which Goebel redirected past Ewasiuk. A little over four minutes later, Slater and Lalonde were at it again, setting up a wide-open Goebel in the slot for goal number two.
Goebel goal number three, however, was all him. He took a pass at the blue line, brought the puck into the zone, moved it through a Lancer defender’s legs, and fired the puck at the net. Ewasiuk came up with it between his legs, and a trailing Drew Miller tapped it free as he skated by the net.
Ewasiuk lay down, covering the puck, but thinking he heard a whistle, started to sit back up. In the meantime, Goebel had circled the net, spied the puck, and went after it, tapping it the remaining inches over the goal line.
The Spartans added a fourth goal at the end of the first period on a rifle shot from Corey Potter to go into the locker room up 4-0.
Halfway through the second period, both teams switched goaltenders, with Dominic Vicari replacing Migliaccio between the pipes for the Spartans and Rick Marnon defending the Lancer net. The new goalies made it through the period with no mishaps, as neither team posted goals.
The third period was a different story, however, as Kevin Estrada and Slater each found the back of the net for the Spartans, making the score 6-0, and that was the way the game ended. Overall, the Lancer goalies faced 50 shots, the Spartans 11.
Michigan State hosts the Ice Breaker Invitational next weekend. The Spartans play Findlay in one semifinal Friday at 8 p.m. ET, after Boston College faces Minnesota-Duluth in the other semi.
