PITTSTON, PA – Goaltender Garrett Nieto (Yorba Linda, CA) earned his first career shutout to help the Wilkes University men's ice hockey team past cross-town rival King's College in United Collegiate Hockey Conference (UCHC) and Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) play Wednesday night at Revolution Ice Centre. Wilkes scored three second period goals to earn the win and clinch a spot in the UCHC postseason.

Wilkes improved to 12-8-1 overall on the season, moving to 10-6-0 in the UCHC with 28 points to clinch the Colonels within the top eight teams to make the postseason with four conference games remaining. In the MAC the Colonels kept their title hopes alive, improving to 7-1-0 with 19 points. The MAC title will be decided this weekend when Wilkes hosts Stevenson needing two regulation victories to earn the championship.

King's dropped to 4-15-2 overall, 3-12-1 in the UCHC, and 2-5-1 in the MAC with the home loss.

Following a scoreless first period where the Colonels outshot the Monarchs 12-11, Wilkes wasted little time taking the lead in the second period. Matt Carlson (Delmar, NY) scored just 1:20 in the period with an assist from Cole Jungwirth (Bloomington, MN). The goal was the eighth of the season for the first year forward. Just 17 seconds later fellow first year Cam Lowe (Lancaster, MA) lit the lamp for his eight goal of the year as well off assists from Phil Erickson (Eau Claire, WI) and Jimmy O'Kane (Chicago, IL/Notre Dame Prep).

At the 6:47 mark of the second period Ben Stefanini (Framingham, MA) tallied his team-leading 11th goal of the season with assists from Christian Blomquist (Wauwatosa, WI) and Carlson to make it 3-0.

Nieto was the story throughout as he stopped 11 shots in the first, six in the second, and 11 more in the third for the 28-save shutout. Ismael Ralsten made 37 saves on 40 Wilkes shots.

Carlson was dominant in the faceoff circle as he won 13-of-16 attempts. Billy Berry (Redding, CT) added 11 wins, Max Cocchi (Ludlow, MA) 10, and O'Kane seven as Wilkes won the faceoff battle 41-31 overall.

Carlson had eight shots on goal as he was followed by Patrick Roginski (ShelbyTwp, MI) with six and Blomquist with five. Steven Spetz (Oak Ridge, NJ) was a +3 in the game.

Wilkes went 0-for-2 on the power play with seven shots while the penalty kill was strong, holding King's to an 0-for-5 mark on the power play as Nieto stopped all 11 shots on the man down.

Wilkes has won nine of its last 10 games heading into a two-game series with Stevenson to decide the MAC title and with big UCHC playoff positioning on the line. Game one will drop the puck at 5:00 p.m. Friday at the Toyota SportsPlex followed by game two on Saturday night at 7:30 p.m. for Senior Night.