{"id":51582,"date":"2013-04-12T15:19:02","date_gmt":"2013-04-12T20:19:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/?p=51582"},"modified":"2013-04-12T15:19:02","modified_gmt":"2013-04-12T20:19:02","slug":"fourth-meeting-for-quinnipiac-yale-has-everything-on-the-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wwwproxy.uscho.com\/2013\/04\/12\/fourth-meeting-for-quinnipiac-yale-has-everything-on-the-line\/","title":{"rendered":"Fourth meeting for Quinnipiac, Yale has everything on the line"},"content":{"rendered":"
Three Saturdays ago, Quinnipiac and Yale faced one another in the ECAC Hockey consolation game. The stands in Atlantic City were nearly bare.<\/p>\n
Yale could have saved itself the trouble of waiting for the result of the CCHA title game by guaranteeing itself an NCAA tournament spot with a win, but Quinnipiac had little motivation to be on the ice.<\/p>\n
[scg_html_ff2013]Saturday, three weeks later, the stands at Consol Energy Center will be packed and the Bobcats and Bulldogs both will have every reason to feel motivated as they square off for a national championship.<\/p>\n
“No one likes to play a consolation game,” Yale coach Keith Allain said.<\/p>\n
Every college player, though, would give anything to play for a national title.<\/p>\n
Quinnipiac won that consolation game 3-0, the third win for the Bobcats against Yale this season. Saturday, though, everyone in the Bobcats locker room expects to see a very different Yale team.<\/p>\n
“I think they’re playing on a different level of hockey right now,” Quinnipiac defenseman Zach Currie said. “They’ve won some impressive games including last night, but I think our approach doesn’t change.<\/p>\n
“We’ve played the same way all year. We’ve played some very good lines, some very good players and some very good teams. We play our hockey. We play the way we want to play, and that’s how we’re going to take care of that.”<\/p>\n
“I think our record so far against them kind of goes out the window in a game like this,” senior forward Jeremy Langlois said. “I think more than anything, just playing a team so many times, you kind of get the feel of what they do well and what we do well.”<\/p>\n
Over the past three games of the NCAA tournament, what Yale has done very well is attack. They’ve successfully found a transition game that put plenty of pressure on the defenses of Minnesota, North Dakota and Massachusetts-Lowell, forcing turnovers that have led to quality scoring opportunities.<\/p>\n
Coach Rand Pecknold will look to rely upon the experience of his defensemen to remain composed against this aggressive Bulldogs team.<\/p>\n
“They’re veterans,” Pecknold said of a defensive corps that features four seniors, one junior and one sophomore. “Ton of game experience with those seniors, and you can’t substitute for game savvy. They deal with adversity well.”<\/p>\n