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| Keith Petruzzelli shut out Colgate twice en route to ECAC Player & Goaltender of the Week |
It was another good weekend for Quinnipiac hockey as the Bobcats swept the Colgate Raiders in a home and home series shutting out the Colgate 3-0 in both games starting Friday in Hamilton followed by a Sunday game back in Hamden. Quinnipiac is now on its second four game winning streak of the season and has a record of 10-4-1 along with sitting in first place in the ECAC by three points. Here are my thoughts and observations from this past weekend.
- The star of the weekend was Keith Petruzzelli who has now recorded three straight shutouts and has four on the season. The senior won the ECAC player and goaltender of the week award after his stellar weekend when he made 38 saves in the two games. Petruzzelli has definitely saved his best season for his last.
- The Quinnipiac defense cannot be overlooked as they definitely have played a key role in three straight shutouts. They are definitely starting to gel and it seems like a lot of this came to happen once Jayden Lee settled in after missing first part of the season.
- Ty Smilanic is a such a great player to watch in a Bobcats uniform. He's easily the most talented player in program history and his play on the ice is showing that. Smilanic leads the team with 10 goals with three of them of game winning variety. His snipe of a goal against Colgate on Sunday was a thing of beauty. Let's hope he sticks around the Bobcats program for a couple of seasons.
- The fact that Desi Burgart has stepped up offensively especially in the wake of the Wyatt Bongiovanni has been huge. The junior already 10 points this season and is just two points behind his total point production in his first two seasons. Secondary scoring for the Bobcats is important and Burgart has given them just that.
- The Bobcats who usually are very good on face-offs struggled this weekend losing the face-off battle on Friday before edging out the Raiders 26-24 on Sunday. That is an area the Bobcats need to be better at especially when they play stronger teams.
- Three more assists this past weekend for Odeen Tufto who continues to pad his national scoring lead with 27 points, 8 more Brandon Kruse and Cameron Wright of Bowling Green. He has nine multi-point games this season and has only been held scoreless in one of the Bobcats games this season. I'd love to see the goal totals increase but his continued play should make him one of the Hobey Baker favorites this season.
- More than halfway through the regular season, you can start to get a read on some of these teams in the ECAC. Quinnipiac is probably the best team right now as they have scored the most goals and have given up just a shade over two goals per game. St. Lawrence looks improved on defense but they are still having scoring issues. Clarkson can score but there goal differential is only a plus eight. Colgate has shown they are competitive but they struggle to score goals and they have a goal differential of minus eight. With 11 games to go this will be a dogfight between Quinnipiac, Clarkson and St. Lawrence for the regular season title.
- Big weekend on tap for Quinnipiac as they head to North Country for a three game slate against Clarkson. Two weeks ago the Bobcats took two of three against the Golden Knights in a hard fought well played series. Lets hope we get more of the same this weekend. After this weekend the Bobcats will only have to play St. Lawrence and Colgate the rest of the way before the ECAC Tournament.
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