Men's Hockey: Team to start year after sweeping 2 exhibitions at home

The Tigers opened their 2010-11 season last weekend with two wins in two exhibition games against University of Quebec at Trois-Rivieres and Morrisville State. Princeton’s first win was a 5-4 come-from-behind victory with the game-winning goal coming with only 35 seconds left to play. The Tigers followed this win by crushing Morrisville State 7-1 on Saturday.

“We won both our exhibition games, which is definitely the start we wanted,” senior forward Sam Sabky said. “We did a lot of things right out there, but there are some things we recognized we need to sharpen up. We want to play three periods of Princeton hockey every game, which means we need to play our game from the drop of the puck.”

With a pair of non-ECAC games against teams they will face again this season, the Tigers hope to build on last year’s difficult season.

“Last year was a disappointing season,” senior defenseman Taylor Fedun said. “We had all the tools to have a very successful year — we were ranked in the top 10 in the country going into the season — but we were plagued by injuries and we never got on a roll.”

Though the Tigers graduated eight seniors from last year’s team, they are optimistic about this season.

“This year guys have come in healthy, and we’re looking to continue the success we’ve had in the past,” Sabky said. “We have a lot of key players returning this year that have proven themselves. Taylor Fedun is coming back from an injury, and he’s the kind of guy who will make an immediate impact on the ice as soon as he can play. Everyone has high expectations about this season, and the intensity and work ethic needed to achieve that is there.”

The Ivy Shootout is the first of three times the Tigers will face Dartmouth and either Yale or Brown this season. In these teams’ most recent games, from last season, Princeton defeated Dartmouth 5-3 and Brown 7-3 but lost to Yale 7-4.

“With a full week of practice to work at it we should be ready to hit the ground running in New Haven this weekend,” Fedun said.

“Our league is very competitive,” Sabky said. “Every game matters and they are all close. Staying healthy is going to be key ... Besides that we need to play Princeton hockey at all times. When we were successful [last year] it was because we committed ourselves to playing by our on-ice objectives at all times. That made us very hard to play against, and other teams knew it. If we can establish that identity from the get-go, and uphold it the entire season, we will be successful.”

In the team’s exhibition games, sophomore forward Will MacDonald leads Princeton with three goals, followed by senior forward Kevin Lohry with two goals. The rest of the scoring was split with goals by senior defenseman Cam Ritchie, senior forward Mike Kramer, junior forward Marc Hagel, junior defenseman Derrick Pallis and freshmen forwards Eric Carlson and Andrew Calof. Cumulatively, the Tigers outshot their opponents 102-35.

“As in any sport, the success that our team will have this year will be dictated by our ability to maintain consistency in our game plan every game, every week,” senior defenseman Matt Godlewski said. “If we can have 28 guys buy into the philosophies and systems of our team, we know that we can achieve success. That’s the way this program has achieved success in the past, and that is how we will achieve success this season.”