Sports
Hockey: Ohio Drops Season Opener To John Carroll, 5-4
By: Nick Hart
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The Ohio hockey team dropped its season opener for the first time since 2006 on Friday night, losing to John Carroll, 5-4, in overtime.
The Blue Streaks’ captain Dan Potter scored with only 1:07 remaining in the sudden death period. Surrounded by Ohio defenders, Potter lost his balance, fell to his knees, but was still able to place a shot right over the glove of the Bobcats’ starting goalie, Scott Boyd.
“It’s the first game of the year, so it’s not the end of the world,” Ohio head coach Jonathon Sheridan said. “There’s some areas we need to work on, but I’m proud of the boys for coming back to force overtime.”
Ohio’s Michael Harris opened the scoring at 9:11 of the first period, but after three quick goals by the Blue Streaks, Harris and the rest of the Bobcats found themselves trailing their opponent for most of the game.
Matt Curry scored on the power play at 12:27 of the first to tie the game, and two highlight reel goals from freshman Kevin Vinyard shortly thereafter had John Carroll leading Ohio, 3-1.
Boyd allowed three goals on only four shots faced in the opening frame, but Sheridan was not willing to put any blame on the netminder making his Bobcat debut.
“Any goalie, when it’s your first game and there’s a full house, it’s going to be hard. There’s a lot of pressure on him,” Sheridan said. “[Boyd] came up big for us when we needed him to… I was happy with how he played.”
Several other Bobcats were playing in their first game in a green and white sweater, including Joe Breslin, who saved the game on two separate occasions for Ohio. Once by making a great defensive play to rob John Carroll of a goal when the score was 4-3 in the third period, and again when he stuffed in the game-tying goal on a wrap-around with 7:20 remaining in regulation.
Breslin’s goal and two assists did not go unnoticed, as he earned No. 1 star of the game honors after the game and praise from his coach.
“[Breslin] is a special player. He works hard in practice, and obviously you can see he works hard in here. I think that whole line of Spellacy, Agnew, and Breslin did great for us [Friday night].”
The forward combination of freshmen Patrick Spellacy and Breslin with senior Brett Agnew totaled six points by the end of the game, and each player had scored a goal.
Logan Lopicka recorded the Blue Streaks second power play goal and fourth goal overall at 9:29 of the second period when his shot from the top of the circle hit Boyd but managed to trickle across the goal line behind him.
John Carroll’s goalie Justin Camuto turned away 47 of the 51 shots Ohio threw at him during the course of the 63:53 contest.
The Bobcats will get their chance at revenge Saturday in the second game of the weekend series between the two clubs. Puck drop is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. at Bird Arena.