Three things from the weekend that was in Atlantic Hockey:
How full is your glass?
Every Atlantic Hockey team came away from this weekend with something positive, albeit some squad’s glasses were more full than others.
None of the five series played resulted in sweeps, with Canisius and Sacred Heart coming out with the best results: three points each against Air Force and Holy Cross, respectively.
The other three series ended in splits: Bentley/Niagara, Rochester Institute of Technology/American International and Mercyhurst/Army West Point.
Splits have been the rule so far, and sweeps the exception. Out of 41 weekend series plays so far this season, only 14 have resulted in one team getting all four points.
Even Robert Morris, which was idle, could find some solace in the results. The Colonials started the weekend in second place, one point behind Air Force. With the rest of the league burning two games in hand on RMU, Derek Schooley’s squad is now tied for third, just two points behind the first-place Falcons.
The ones that don’t go in
As The Great One said: “You miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take”.
But if you’re facing a good goalie, you miss a lot of the ones you do. This was evident when inspecting the box scores from this past weekend.
In the eight games that had a winner, the team on top was outshot handily in seven of them:
- Bentley 6, Niagara 3 (Friday) – Niagara out shot Bentley 37-21.
- Canisius 4, Air Force 3 (Friday) – Air Force outshot Canisius 39-12. Canisius scored four goals on six shots in the first period.
- Sacred Heart 2, Holy Cross 1 (Friday) – Holy Cross outshot Sacred Heart 33-23. But the Pioneers outshot the Crusaders 1-0 in overtime, and that one, by Justin Danforth, was the difference.
- Mercyhurst 3, Army West Point 1 (Friday) – The Black Knights more than doubled up the Lakers in shots, 46-22.
- Niagara 3, Bentley 1 (Saturday) – Bentley outshot Niagara 38-30.
- Army West Point 4, Mercyhurst 1 (Saturday) – Shots were 31-28 in favor of the Lakers, the smallest margin of the weekend in games not ending in a tie.
- American International 5, Rochester Institute of Technology 3 (Saturday) – RIT had 41 shots on goal to AIC’s 28.
The exception to the rule was in the RIT vs. AIC game on Friday, a 5-0 win for the Tigers that saw them dominate on the shot counter as well, 40-18.
Standouts in net
As you could expect in a number of wins by teams outshot by a wide margin, we had some great goaltending performances:
- Canisius’s Charles Williams made 38 saves on 39 shots in the Golden Griffin’s 4-1 win over Air Force on Friday. Williams was again on his game on Saturday, making 46 saves in a 2-1 tie with the Falcons.
- Mercyhurst goaltender Brandon Wildung allowed just one goal on 46 shots in a 3-1 Lakers win at Army West Point.
- Joe O’Brien stopped 37 of 38 shots to lead Niagara to its first win since November 19, 3-1 over Bentley.
- And finally, AIC freshman Zackaris Skog made 38 saves in a 5-3 for the Yellow Jackets over RIT on Saturday.
