Sports
Ohio Hockey Almost Puts Two Touchdowns on John Carroll
By: Jacob Hack
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The Bobcats hockey team rode the wave of offense from Friday night’s game into Saturday night at Bird Arena and beat the John Carroll Blue Streaks 13-0.
Ohio dominated play in the offensive zone throughout all three periods, out shooting the John Carroll 54 to 8. Thirteen of those 54 shots ended up in the back of the net as Ohio was able to coast their way to an opening weekend sweep.
The Bobcats got things started quickly as freshman Garrett Jenkins netted his first career goal just 5:54 into the first period. From then on the ‘Cats never looked back, adding four more tallies in the first from Liam Geither, a shorthanded goal, Grant Hazel, on a penalty shot, Matt Rudin, who finished the game with a hat trick, and once again Grant Hazel, this one on the power play.
As the night went on so did the theme of freshmen scoring. Austin Heakins added two in the second, along with goals from Drew Crandall, Bryan Lubin, and Matt Rudin’s second of the night. While it might shock some that there’s so many freshmen that are able to contribute at such an early stage of the season, coach Sean Hogan isn’t surprised at all. “We knew we had a really great recruiting class, we think they’re all going to contribute a lot and we’re going to be a really deep team. We have a chance to be really good.”
Even going into the third period leading by 10 goals, Rudin knew they couldn’t lose focus, “When you score that many goals in a game you’re having fun scoring,” Rudin said, “but at the same time you don’t want to run up the score. We decided to start using different systems, so we got benefit of playing while being up that much.”
Rudin, who’s hat trick was completed with 12:37 left in the game, along with captain Matt Hartman, who scored twice in the third, capped off the Bobcats big offensive night.
Defensively, goalie Ryan Heltion recorded his first shutout of the season on eight shots from the overmatched Blue Streaks.
The Ohio penalty kill was also successful. The Bobcats were 2-2 on the kill Saturday and 7-7 in the weekend series.
Even with the success, Hogan knows there’s still work to be done. “I think we were great in the neutral zone, but they couldn’t get the puck into the zone, so I don’t know how good the penalty kill is yet,” Hogan said. “We’ll see next weekend against Kent State, they’re supposed to be pretty good this year.”
Ohio will look to keep the offensive power and special teams momentum going next weekend as they host the Kent State Golden Flashes at Bird Arena on Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.