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 Derek Punches has a goal in each of the last four games. |
March 13, 2008
GAME STORYLINES
The Wayne State men's hockey team (10-24-2, 6-14-0 CHA) enters its third consecutive College Hockey America quarterfinal matchup against Alabama-Huntsville (6-20-4, 3-13-4 CHA) looking to avenge two straight playoff losses to the Chargers. The puck drops at Niagara's Dwyer Arena on Friday night at 7:05 p.m. ET with live Internet audio on Teamline and video on B2 Networks.
Wayne State split its final home series last weekend against 20th-ranked Niagara, taking Friday's game in dramatic fashion with a 3-2 overtime win before dropping a 7-3 decision on Saturday. Alabama-Huntsville, after being dealt a 5-3 loss Friday at Robert Morris, scored late in the third period Saturday to salvage a 2-2 overtime tie.
Either the Warriors or Chargers will face top-seeded Bemidji State in the semifinals Saturday at 2:00, while Niagara and Robert Morris will battle in the 7:00 game. The CHA Championship is slated for Sunday at 2:00 and will be broadcast live on CSTV.
BEHIND THE BENCH
Bill Wilkinson is in his ninth season as Wayne State's head coach and his 26th year as a collegiate head coach. Wilkinson's overall record stands at 436-468-81, while his mark at WSU is 123-167-28. He entered the 2007-08 season ranked 23rd on the NCAA all-time wins list.
Head coach Danton Cole is in his first season at the helm of the Chargers.
THROUGH THE YEARS
While Wayne State trails in the all-time series, 16-22-3, the Warriors won three of their four meetings with the Chargers this season. The two teams have met five times in the CHA Tournament, three of which resulted in WSU wins. The Warriors defeated the Chargers in the 2001 and 2002 finals as well as the 2004 quarterfinal.
IN THE POLLS
Wayne State was selected to finish fourth in the CHA preseason coaches poll, while UAH was predicted to finish fifth.
ON THIS DATE
Wayne State's only prior action on March 14 was a 4-2 win over Air Force in the 2003 CHA Tournament quarterfinals in Kearney, Neb. WSU went on to win the league crown that year and make its only appearance in the NCAA Regional.
SCOUTING ALABAMA-HUNTSVILLE
With a 6-20-4 overall record, the Chargers have the third-lowest winning percentage (.267) in Division I, ahead of only Brown (.258) and Western Michigan (.250). They rank last nationally in scoring offense (2.00), scoring defense (3.77) and penalty killing (71.8), while their power-play unit has the third-lowest percentage (10.6).
Sophomore Brandon Roshko, who ranks tied for fifth in scoring among CHA defensemen, is UAH's leader in points with 17 assists. Junior forward Matt Sweazey, who scored the game-tying goal Saturday at Robert Morris, is the Chargers' top goal-scorer with nine, including five power-play tallies.
Sophomore goaltender Blake MacNicol is 5-10-4 in 23 games and has a 3.16 goals-against average and a .902 save percentage. He matched his season-high of 36 saves in Saturday's tie, his 12th 30-plus save performance of the year.
LAST TIME OUT
Junior forward Derek Punches scored the game-winning goal 79 seconds into overtime to give WSU a 3-2 victory over Niagara last Friday night. The Warriors snapped a three-game skid overall and a five-game winless streak against the Purple Eagles dating back to February 2007.
Freshman Brock Meadows posted his second two-point game of the season with a goal and an assist, and senior captain Mike Forgie lit the lamp for the first time since Jan. 25 against Alabama-Huntsville.
Niagara erased two one-goal deficits, but Punches would need just one shot in overtime to put the game away, with assists from Stavros Paskaris and Derek Bachynski, who extended their respective point streaks to seven and six games.
Paskaris would stretch his streak to eight games, matching the school record originally set by Dustin Kingston in 2003, in Saturday's 7-3 setback. He assisted on all three power-play goals, scored by Bachynski, Punches, and Tylor Michel. Jeff Caister also chipped in with a pair of helpers as the Warriors lost their final home game despite a season-high 40 shots on goal, including 24 in the second period, one shy of the school single-period record.
RECORDS AND MILESTONES
The eight-game point streak by Paskaris is one of many milestones reached by the Warriors last weekend. Paskaris also has an assist in seven straight games, besting the previous mark of six set by Nick Shrader in 1999, the inaugural year of Warrior hockey. Not only did Paskaris match his career-high with three assists Saturday, but he registered all three in the second period to break the previous single-period mark of two which was repeated 47 times, including by Caister in the same game.
Paskaris has also broken the school records for CHA points (27) and assists (18) in a single year as well as the career marks (64 P, 41 A). With 97 career points overall, he needs two more to surpass former defenseman Tyler Kindle (1999-2003) for third all-time at Wayne State.
Caister's two assists Saturday gave him a total of 26 for the season, eclipsing Jason Durbin's school record of 25 set in the 2002-03 campaign. Already the WSU standard-bearer for assists in a single season by a defenseman, Caister needs one more point to pass Kindle's blueliner mark of 29 set in 2001-02. After just two years at WSU, he ranks tied-for-fifth all-time among defensemen with 45 career points and fifth with 40 assists (tied-for-10th overall).
Punches' goal on Friday was the fourth-fastest overtime game-winner (1:19) in school history and the second-fastest this season behind Caister's game-winning goal Jan. 12 at Northern Michigan (0:59). He has a career-best six-game point streak, including goals in each of his last four, and has set career-highs in goals (10), assists (9), points (19) and power-play goals (5) this season.
Bachynski, who has a career-best seven-game point streak, set a new personal mark of nine goals and matched his previous high of 21 points in just 18 games this season. His seven power-play goals ties the third-highest single-season total in school history, and he ranks in the top 15 all-time at WSU in career points (64), goals (27) and assists (37).
WSU NOTES
Paskaris, who has 27 points in his last 15 games, leads the Warriors with 38 overall and ranks fourth in the league. He is tied-for-31st nationally in points per game (1.06) and tied-for-22nd in assists per game (0.69).
Caister, Wayne State's second-leading scorer this season (3-26--29), leads all CHA blueliners in scoring (sixth overall). He ranks fifth in Division I among defensemen averaging 0.81 points per game and 18th overall with 0.72 assists per game.
Six Warriors - Paskaris (Oct. 13), Michel (Dec. 7), Bachynski (Jan. 12), Forgie (Feb. 9), Matt Krug (Feb. 29) and Punches (Mar. 1) - reached the milestone of 100 career games this season. Additionally, Punches has the longest active games played streak at 76 dating back to Feb. 24, 2006.
Meadows' goal on Friday marked just the seventh time this season WSU has been the first team to score. The Warriors have a record of 6-1-0 in those games.
After winning just three of their first 20 games (3-15-2, .200), the Warriors are 7-9-0 (.438) in their last 16 contests. In this recent span, they have averaged 3.13 goals per game and are 18-for-82 (22.0 percent) on the power play. They have also successfully killed 67 of their opponents' 83 man-advantage opportunities (80.7 percent) over the 14-game stretch. Comparatively, Wayne State averaged just 1.75 goals per game and struggled on both the power play (13.9) and penalty kill (71.8) over the first 20 games of the season.
Wayne State is 8-4 all-time in 12 contests at the CHA Tournament entering this weekend. After winning their first eight, however, the Warriors have dropped each of the last four, including two straight to UAH.
Including Friday's 3-2 win, WSU is 18-11-28 (.561) in 57 games that have reached sudden death overtime. Wayne State has gone to an extra period four times in CHA Tournament play, beginning with a 3-2 victory over Niagara in 2001, WSU's first year in the league. The Warriors earned a 5-4 win over UAH in the 2002 championship game but, in the second-longest contest in school history (79:09), they fell to Air Force, 4-3, in a 2005 quarterfinal. Last year, Alabama-Huntsville erased a three-goal deficit to edge Wayne State, 4-3, in the quarterfinal game.
