The Bowling Green Falcons (8-11-1) continued their hot play of late, upsetting the No. 12 Colgate Raiders (10-4-4) by a score of 4-0 at the BG Ice Arena on Tuesday night.
The Falcons, coming off a championship at the Toyota UConn Holiday Classic last weekend, are riding a four-game winning streak, their longest of the year. The Raiders are now winless in their last three outings.
“This was as complete a game as we’ve had from start to finish all season long, against a real good hockey team,” said BG coach Scott Paluch. “[Colgate has] won a lot of hockey games for a reason. We weren’t in a lot of trouble very often.”
Bowling Green got a solid performance between the pipes from senior goaltender Jon Horrell; he notched his fifth win of the year, and his first shutout as a Falcon. The shutout was not his first collegiate shutout, however. He posted one with his former team, the now-defunct Findlay Oilers.
“He played the game just the way he had to,” said Paluch of his netminder. “Our team did a tremendous job limiting the quality chances. Jon is on a terrific streak right now. He’s playing really well.”
“Every other night, we have a different goalie in there,” said sophomore center Jonathan Matsumoto, “but him stepping up and showing that he can be the number-one guy, I think that speaks a lot for him.”
Horrell stopped all 22 shots he faced in the win.
The Raiders came into the game with the ninth-best scoring offense in the nation, averaging 3.53 goals per game, but were shut down by a stingy Falcon defense.
The Falcons were able to muster enough offense in the first two periods to cruise to the victory. The scoring was balanced, with three different lines accounting for the goals.
“It’s continual,” said Paluch. “Against UConn, there were nine different goal-scorers in that game and tonight, we had the same type of thing. We have some scoring lines, but when we get contributions from a lot of lines, we can be dangerous.”
The Falcons jumped out to a 1-0 lead on a power-play goal at the 14:32 mark of the opening period. Freshman winger Brandon Svendsen scored his sixth goal of the year just 12 seconds into the man-advantage, driving a shot from the point, and beating Colgate netminder Mark Dekanich over the shoulder. Matsumoto and Michael Hodgson assisted.
Brett Pilkington gave the Falcons a 2-0 lead at 6:54 of the second period, as he bounced a puck past Dekanich from the side of the net. The goal was his fourth of the year and was assisted by James Unger.
Alex Foster, the nation’s third-leading scorer, added to the Falcons’ scoring column at 10:42 of the period. He picked the pocket of a Colgate defenseman in the Raider zone, then fired a shot from between the circles for his sixth goal and 33rd point of the year. The goal was unassisted.
Ryan Barnett closed out the scoring late in the third period with his second goal of the year for the Falcons.
Bowling Green was 1-for-7 on the power play, while the Raiders were 0-for-5.
Colgate will continue nonconference action this weekend as the Raiders play host to St. Cloud State.
Bowling Green will return to CCHA play this weekend, matching up in a home-and-home series against No. 19 Ohio State.
