CANTLON: QUINNIPIAC BLANKS UCONN 

CANTLON: Quinnipiac BLANKS UCONN

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BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

HARTFORD, CT – The Quinnipiac Bobcats (7-10-2 overall, 3-5-1 ECACHL) came into the game with offensive problems but were able to find three goals in dealing UCONN its second straight shutout loss, 3-0, on Tuesday night before 3,852 at the XL Center.

The post-holiday scoring drought for the Huskies (8-13-2 overall, 5-8-1 Hockey East) has been extended to six periods. Over that stretch, they’ve been outscored 5-0 after having played so well just before the break.

“I am really happy with the way we played and I am really happy with the defense we’re playing, but we’re struggling to score goals. It happens as you go through the season. We were going well there for awhile, but we have to to do a better job of getting to the blue area and to the net. The story of the game was (we had) 58 attempts, 17 blocked, and 20 off target,” remarked UCONN head coach Mike Cavanaugh. “37 of the 58 attempts never get to the net. That’s why we’re not scoring. The powerplay wasn’t sharp. Our first one was good, but we were out of sync. We had a five-on-three and didn’t get the puck to the net.” 

The Huskies start the heart of the Hockey East schedule on Friday night at the XL Center. They’ll host Merrimack at 7 pm in the first part of a home-and-home with the Warriors.

For Quinnipiac’s head coach Rand Pecknold, this season has been out of character for his team. They have particularly struggled at home (3-7-1). The Bobcats will be playing on the road for the next six games, so it might help.

“It wasn’t our best game. We were a little rusty. In the first, Shorty (goaltender, Andrew Shortridge) was our best player and that’s what you want. Great goalies make great coaches. The challenges have been playing at home. Our record has been phenomenal over the last five years; we’ve always been good at home. Its been an aberration this year. We played well (then), just one mistake and it gets in the back of the net; bad penalty, a turnover here, we just haven’t gotten any breaks. We did not use to. We have been dominant for so many years. Players and coaches are going, ‘What’s going on here?’ So, maybe we get on the road, bond a little bit. Its been an unusual year for us. We’re resilient. It wasn’t a perfect outing, but (the) PK was good, Shorty was good and we found a way to win,” Pecknold said.

The Bobcats got a bit of good fortune on their second goal. Some ragged play by the Huskies at their own blue line kept the home team from getting the puck out of their own end. QU’s Scott Davidson took possession of the puck and just launched it at the net. Adam Huska made the initial save but it seemed as if Nick Jeremiah may have gotten a piece of Davidson’s shot. The rolling puck came out to Bo Pieper who wired his fourth of the season past Huska at 6:30.

“We have talked a lot to our players about trying to take one-timers. My stats might be off at the NHL level, but 45% of all goals are one-timers. It might be higher, I’m not sure. Goalies like Huska and Shorty are so good, its tough to catch them (off guard), so its tough to get those on the edge like that and we want more one-timers and our forward did a great job there hammering it,” Pecknold remarked.

The Bobcats Kevin Mckernan followed flipping one from behind his blue line into an empty net for his second of the season at 19:00. That would close out the scoring and seal the win for Quinnipiac.

For Shortridge, the winter break was a big help for the struggling Bobcats as he posted his fourth shutout of the season. “Starting out with a win like that was huge, a momentum builder for us. We go home to our families and mentally reset; get away from the rink, enjoy the time at home, and come back hungry, and ready to go,” Shortridge, a senior from Anchorage, Alaska said.

The second period was not crisp, or clean hockey. The two teams managed 16 shots between them and there were long stretches of little offensive pressure or perimeter shots.

“The boys were great in front of me,” a smiling Shortridge said after facing just 21 shots in the victory. “Guys kept them wide and were able to give me a lot of one-and-done opportunities. The forwards were blocking shots at the point and when we needed big plays, guys came up with them. That contributed to a huge team win.”

The Bobcats were able to capture the games’ first goal when Alex Whalen was able to pounce on a rebound off Huska’s glove after derailing Kevin Duane’s shot attempt. Whalen put it into the open cage at 6:15 for his seventh goal of the season.

NOTES:

Whelan led QU with four shots while Kalter and Cory Ronan had four shots apiece for the Huskies.

Shortridge’s record is 6-8-2 while Huska falls to 8-12-2.

Nine penalties were called in the game from referee tandem of Peter Schlittenhardt and Tim Benedetto. They called what appeared to be a lot of ticky-tacky stuff while missing some obvious penalties like when a UCONN defenseman tackled a QU player or a blatant slash on Brian Freeman.

Quinnipiac has received a commitment from TJ Friedmann of the Victoria Royals (BCHL) for 2019-20.

Bobcat alum Jordan Samuels-Thomas (West Hartford) has left with mutual agreement from San Diego (AHL) and signed with BK Mlada Boleslav (Czech Republic-CEL).

Chase Ziesky (Avon/Avon Old Farms) has left Providence College (HE) as has freshmen Jake Ryczek. The Friars are adding defenseman Davis Bunz for the second semester from Central Illinois (USHL).

Evan Bell of Merrimack (HE) has left school and returned to his junior team Fargo Force (USHL).

UCONN had one minor roster change during the break. Defenseman Bryan Nelson, who hasn’t played this year, elected to drop out of the program but is still enrolled in school.

The US Olympic roster was named yesterday for the 2018 PyeonChang, South Korea Olympic Games that will be held next month. There are plenty of Connecticut connections on both the men’s and women’s team.

Three former Yale Bulldogs were named to the men’s team. They are Brian O’Neill (presently with KHL Jokerit Helsinki-Finland 25 points-32 games), Broc Little (HC Davos Switzerland-LNA 35-19-12-31) and Milford’s Mark Arcobello, who played his public school hockey with the Fairfield Prep Jesuits and prep school hockey at Salisbury Prep (SC Bern 39 points in 33 games).

Arcobello becomes the fourth Jesuit to wear a US Olympic sweater. Bonus points if you know the other three? Answer at the end.

It probably helps that current Yale head coach Keith Allain (North Branford) is one of the assistant coaches. The other assistant is former Whaler, Scott Young, who is now the Pittsburgh Penguins’ Director of Player Development. Young was inducted into the USHHOF last month in a ceremony in Boston.

Ben Smith is the current US Director of Player Development and was an assistant at Yale under the late Tim Taylor.

There are four ex-Wolf Pack/CT Whale on the team. That list is headed by current AHL leading scorer leader, Hershey’s Chris Bourque who has 39 points in 35 games.

Second on the list is Matt Gilroy, who is an ex-CT Whale-Wolf Pack/Ranger. He’s currently playing with Jokerit Helsinki (44-6-19-25 and a plus-17). Gilroy had his number 8 retired at Boston University and entered the BU Hall of Fame last month.

Chad Kolarik, ex-Wolf Pack/Ranger, is with Cologne (Germany-DEL 52-25-16-41). The last is former Rangers first round pick, Bobby Sanguinetti, who’s playing with HC Lugano (Switzerland-LNA) where he has 15 points in 31 games.

On the women’s roster, the team’s head coach is a very familiar name to Connecticut minor-league pro hockey fans. He is former New Haven Nighthawk and Wolf Pack goalie, Robb Stauber, who was a Hobey Baker winner at the University of Minnesota.

One of his assistant coaches is former Rangers defenseman, Paul Mara.

Hillary Knight (Choate Prep) is back on the team looking for gold.

The Paralympic head coach is Dan Brennan, but NOT the one who played with the Nighthawks in the mid-1980’s.

Former Hartford Whaler, Sean Burke, is the GM of Team Canada. He said he has filled 20 of his 25 spots and one player who might have made the list is former Wolf Pack, and Ranger, P.A. Parenteau. P.A. helped Canada win their third straight Spengler Cup in a 3-0 shutout of Switzerland over the weekend. Parenteau presently plays with Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg (Russia-KHL).

The goalie for Team Canada in the game was ex-Sound Tiger, Kevin Poulin. On the backline was former Sound Tiger, Victor Bartley.

The tourney, a long-time European Christmas-time tradition, features some old familiar names. Team Switzerland has the basis of their potential Olympic team. They had ex-Pack, Raphael Diaz, who’s skating with HC Davos from Switzerland-LNA league. He had the aforementioned Little and ex-Pack, Andres Ambuhl, playing for the Czech Republic’s HK Mountfield (CEL). Also, they had ex-Pack Petr Zamorsky and from Latvia Dynamo Riga (KHL) they had ex-Pack, Danny Kristo.

Other familiar names are almost certain to be included when the nations reveal their final rosters.

Trivia Answer: The brother’s, Drury – Ted and Chris – who played on the both US Olympic and World Junior teams in their standout careers.

The other player is lesser known. He is Barry Richter who played his freshmen year at Fairfield Prep on a line with Ted Drury before his father Pat took the job as the AD at the University of Wisconsin. He still holds that job today. Richter was drafted by the Hartford Whalers in the second round, 32nd overall in 1988 but never played for them. Richter played four games with the Rangers. He had other NHL stops with the Boston, Islanders, and Montreal for a total of 151 NHL games.

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