Wilkes Men's Ice Hockey Pushes Conference Streak to Four at Chatham
PITTSBURGH, Pa. – The Wilkes University men's ice hockey team pushed its win streak to start the United Collegiate Hockey Conference (UCHC) season to four with a 6-4 win at Chatham University on Saturday evening.
The Colonels improved to 4-0 in conference and 4-1 overall with the win.
Chatham got on the board first at 3:32 in the first with an unassisted goal from Eric Hildebrand.
Danny Reidel (Wayne, NJ) tied the score at the 10-minute mark with an unassisted goal of his own.
After the Cougars were called for slashing at 10:24, Wilkes took advantage of the power-play opportunity when Tyson Araujo (Oak Bluffs, MA/) helped the Colonels to their first lead with an extra-man tally assisted by Donald Flynn (Randolph, NJ/) and Tyler Barrow (Massapequa, NY/) at 11:14. The score remained 2-1 as the horn sounded to end the first period.
Lucas Rothe evened the score for Chatham when he scored even-strength at 4:11 in the second with an assist from Niko Moulakelis.
Michael Gurska (Revere, MA/) gave Wilkes the lead back at 14:05 on the power-play following a two-minute minor for cross checking on the Cougars, assisted by Barrow and Nick Fea (Oak Ridge, NJ/).
Barrow added a man-up tally at 16:08 with a helper from Gurska following another two-minute cross-checking minor on Chatham.
The Colonels continued their excellence on the power-play with another score at 17:42 following a boarding minor scored by Phil Erickson (Eau Claire, WI/) with assists to Charlie Spetz (Oak Ridge, NJ) and Ryan Solomon (Murray, UT).
The Cougars cut the lead to 5-3 just 22 seconds into the third on a goal from Moulakelis.
Erickson took advantage of an empty Chatham net with his second goal of the game at 18:50 assisted by Fea.
The Colonels found themselves down two men after a hooking penalty and an extra attacker on an empty net, allowing the Cougars to get the lead back down to two goals at 19:18 on Hildebrand's second goal, but Wilkes was able to hold on for the victory.
The Colonels finished with a 57 percent (four-for-seven) success rate on the power play while killing four-of-five penalties. Wilkes outshot Chatham 45-to-33 and was successful on 54.4 percent (43-of-79) of faceoffs.
Michael Paterson-Jones (Baldwinsville, NY) finished with 29 saves in the crease for the Colonels.
Wilkes returns to action on Friday when it travels to King's College for a Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) and UCHC contest with puck drop scheduled for 7:00 p.m.
