Men's Hockey: Quinnipiac dominates Princeton

The Tigers dropped a 5-1 decision at conference-leading No. 9 Quinnipiac (12-1-0, 7-0-0) on Wednesday night. After a scoreless first period, Quinnipiac exploded for four goals in the first six minutes, 18 seconds of the second period to put the game out of reach.

“The score’s not indicative of how the game was played. Their power play just beat us in the second period,” senior forward Mark Magnowski said. “We were just taking bad penalties, and we weren’t able to kill them off. Our penalty kill wasn’t doing that great. We came out not ready to play in the second period.”

Judging by the first period, it was difficult to tell how the game was going to end. Heading into the first intermission, Princeton held an 11-6 edge in shots and a 2-1 advantage in power plays.

Things unraveled quickly in the second period. The Tigers started off shorthanded after a high-sticking penalty to sophomore forward Brodie Zuk at the end of the first frame. At the tail end of the power play, Bobcat forward Jeremy Langlois took a pass from forward Yuri Bouharevich and put it past senior goaltender Zane Kalemba to give his team a 1-0 edge only 1:11 after the break.

Quinnipiac gained another man-advantage opportunity 1:22 later, after freshman defenseman Michael Sdao was called for hitting from behind. The Bobcats quickly capitalized on the penalty when forward Brandon Wong’s goal pushed the lead to 2-0.

Only 50 seconds later, Langlois scored his second goal of the game — this one at even-strength — to make the score 3-0. Defenseman Loren Barron’s power-play goal at 6:18 made it 4-0 and ended a brutal six-minute stretch for Princeton.

Following Barron’s goal, head coach Guy Gadowsky substituted freshman goalie Mike Condon for Kalemba. In the first appearance of his collegiate career, Condon acclimated nicely, saving 12 of the 13 shots that he faced. The only goal Condon allowed came when Barron scored his second power-play goal of the game to give Quinnipiac a 5-0 lead.

“I think [Gadowsky] was trying to give us a spark and just trying different ways to do things for us. It worked out well,” Magnowski said. “Mike played really well. He got some experience in, and it was supposed to give us a spark in the game. I guess in the third period, we did come out better, but the second period in that game really hurt us.”

In the second period, Quinnipiac scored on all four of its power plays. Once again Princeton hurt itself by giving up cheap penalties — a habit that the team has been trying to kick throughout the season.

“They have a good power play, but our penalty kill wasn’t up to our standards. I don’t think we were ready to play,” Magnowski said. “Our heads might not have been in it. We came out flat in that period.”

While the game was out of reach, Princeton outshot the Bobcats in the third period and managed to get its only goal of the game. The tally came after senior forward Dan Bartlett picked up a loose puck, skated past a defender and beat goalie Dan Clarke.

After being a middle-of-the-pack team in ECAC Hockey the last two seasons, Quinnipiac has emerged as one of the premier teams this year, not only in the conference but also in the country.

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“They’re still the same type of team. They are very creative offensively,” Magnowski said. “This year, they just seem to be getting the goals, and it’s just working out for them. They’re playing the same style. They’re just getting the goals at the right time.”

Though Princeton held a 30-28 advantage in shots, it struggled to solve Clarke, Quinnipiac’s talented sophomore netminder. Clarke currently leads the conference with a .932 save percentage and is second with a 2.24 goals-against average.

“I don’t think we made it very difficult for him,” Magnowski said. “We let him see all the shots, and we weren’t really crashing the net like we should be doing. We just didn’t stick to our game, and I think we made it easy on him.”

Princeton will look to turn its season around this weekend when it travels north for two conference games at Brown and No. 11 Yale. The Tigers played both teams in a non-conference series to open the season, and the games this weekend will be a good measuring stick to see how much Princeton has improved over the past month.

“We still believe in ourselves. We still see ourselves as a good team,” Magnowski said. “Each day, we need to be ready to play a full 60-minute game. We talk about a lull that we go through sometimes. We’ve got to play a full 60 minutes to compete in college hockey.”