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Princeton University Athletics
Men's Hockey Heads to Merrimack For Two Games This Weekend
December 08, 2004 | Men's Ice Hockey
Dec. 8, 2004
Princeton, N.J. - The Princeton men's hockey team (4-7-1; 4-6 ECACHL) returns to non-league action this weekend when it visits Merrimack (4-10-2; 1-8-1 Hockey East) for games on Friday and Saturday nights. The Tigers have faced league competition for the last five weekends and will face non-league teams for the first time since the opening weekend of the season.
The puck will drop for both games at 7 p.m. Both games will be broadcast live on GoPrincetonTigers.com. The broadcasts will begin at approximately 6:50 p.m. Links to the broadcasts can be found on the men's hockey schedule page, the multimedia page and the site's frontpage in the events box.
Game Notes in PDF Format
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Setting the Table... The Princeton men's hockey team visits Merrimack for its first non-league games since opening the season on Oct. 29 and 30 against St. Cloud State and Alabama-Huntsville.
Last Weekend... Princeton was swept at No. 13 Colgate and No. 12 Cornell, making it the first weekend all season that the Tigers have not earned at least one point.
The Series with Merrimack... Princeton leads the all-time series against Merrimack with a record of 4-2-2. Princeton won the only meeting that has taken place at Merrimack by a score of 2-0 on Nov. 28, 1997. Merrimack won both meetings between the teams last season in Princeton. The two teams almost met two season ago at the Rensselaer Holiday Tournament, but Princeton dropped its opening game and Merrimack won its game so the two did not meet the following day.
Scouting the Warriors... Merrimack is 4-10-2 on the season and 1-8-1 in Hockey East, which ranks them eighth of the nine teams in the league. Despite a slow start, the Warriors are 2-1-1 in their last four entering this weekend.
Common Opponents... Merrimack and Princeton have had two common opponents thus far this season. Merrimack opened its season with a 5-3 win over Rensselaer and skated to a 4-4 tie against Union two weekends ago. Princeton is 1-1 against those teams, defeating Rensselaer 3-2 and falling to Union 6-4.
Princeton vs. Hockey East... Princeton enters the weekend having dropped its last 10 games against Hockey East Opponents. The Tigers last defeated a Hockey East team on Dec. 28, 1998, when Princeton shut out Boston University 3-0 at the Mariucci Classic in Minneapolis, Minn. Since Hockey East was established in the summer of 1983, Princeton is 12-29-3 overall against Hockey East teams and is 5-18 against Hockey East teams on the road. Last season the Tigers played three games against Hockey East teams, falling at Northeastern and to Merrimack twice at home. Princeton head coach Guy Gadowsky has not coached against a Hockey East team.
Princeton Out of Conference... Princeton is 0-1-1 this season in non-conference games. The ECAC Hockey League is 31-33-7 overall against other conferences this season and is 7-15-2 against Hockey East.
Non-Conference Struggles... Princeton has not won a game against a non-conference opponent in its last 16 tries since a 4-2 win over Bowling Green on Jan. 4, 2002 at Baker Rink. In that stretch Princeton has won a non-league game, but that came against league-foe Rensselaer in an in-season tournament. The Tigers will look to stop that trend in three weekends when they head to Merrimack for a pair of games.
Friday at Colgate... Junior Dustin Sproat had a goal and an assist as Princeton fell at No. 13 Colgate 4-2. Senior Luc Paquin knotted the game up at 2-2 early in the third period, but Dmitry Yashin scored at 7:46 to lift Colgate to the win.
Saturday at Cornell... Princeton became the first team all season to score three goals against Cornell, but it wasn't enough as the Big Red posted a 5-3 win. Senior Jesse Masear, Sproat, and freshman Landis Stankievech scored the Princeton goals in the loss.
Streaking... After having six-game point scoring streaks snapped three games ago at Yale, three Tigers began new streaks last weekend. Sproat, junior Patrick Neundorfer and sophomore Grant Goeckner-Zoeller each posted points in both games of the weekend to begin two games streaks.
Atop the Scoring List... With his three points this weekend at Colgate and Cornell, junior Dustin Sproat has climbed to the team scoring lead with 18 points. That is one more than sophomore Grant Goeckner-Zoeller, two more than senior Luc Paquin and three more than junior Patrick Neundorfer.
Game In-Game Out... Princeton's top four scorers have been contributors almost every time they take the ice. Goeckner-Zoeller has points in 10 of Princeton's 12 games, Neundorfer and Sproat have points in nine of 12, while Paquin has points in eight of 12. Sproat has scored goals in eight different games and those have all come in the last nine outings.
Record Seasons... Senior Luc Paquin has 16 points this season on four goals and 12 assists in 12 games. In the previous 46 games of his career, he had just one goal and nine assists for 10 points. Junior Dustin Sproat has eclipsed his previous high of 11 points, while junior Patrick Neundorfer set a new high of 15 points last weekend. Sophomore Grant Goeckner-Zoeller is three points away from his high of 20, set a season ago.
On the Offensive... After struggling to score goals for several seasons, the Princeton offense has come alive to rank third in the ECAC Hockey League and 17th in the nation. Princeton has scored 40 goals in 12 games for an average of 3.33 goals per game and the Tigers are on pace to score 97 goals in the regular season.
40 Goals... Princeton has 40 goals in 12 games this season. Last season Princeton's 40th goal came in its 20th game, as the first goal in a 5-4 overtime loss, on Jan. 10 against Clarkson at Baker Rink.
Nationally Speaking... Several Tigers are at or near the top of the national scoring charts. Dustin Sproat is tied for seventh in the nation in scoring. He is also fourth in goals. Luc Paquin and Grant Goeckner-Zoeller are tied for fourth in assists. Neundorfer is tied for 14th in power play goals with five and 15th in game-winning goals with two. Paquin leads the nation in scoring by defensemen.
Power Play... Princeton went 3 for 10 last weekend on the power play to lift its efficiency to 28.2% overall and 30.8% in the ECAC Hockey League. Those numbers make Princeton's power play the top extra-man unit in the league and the second best in the nation, percentage points behind UMass-Lowell.
In Goal... Sophomore B.J. Sklapsky and junior Eric Leroux continued to split time in the Princeton net. Sklapsky played at Colgate and Leroux was in net at Cornell.
First Goal... Freshman Landis Stankievech became the fourth member of the Class of 2008 to score a goal when he potted a shorthanded goal Saturday at Cornell. That goal, coupled with a pair of assists gives him three points on the season.
Shorthander... Stankievech's shorthanded goal was Princeton's first of the season and the Tigers' first since the final game of the 2002-03 season at Brown, a 42-game span, when Matt Maglione scored one in an ECAC playoff game.
ECACHL Honors... On Monday, junior Dustin Sproat was named to the ECAC Hockey League Honor Roll. Two weeks ago, he was named the ECACHL Player of the Week following his five-point weekend against Union and Rensselaer. He became Princeton's first league player of the week since Brad Parsons on Feb. 13, 2000 after a six-point weekend at Union and Rensselaer.
Behind the Bench... First-year Princeton coach Guy Gadowsky picked up his first win behind the Princeton bench on Nov. 6 at Dartmouth. The game was his fourth at Princeton and through 12 games, he is 4-7-1. His ECAC opener at Vermont on Nov. 5 was the first time he had faced an ECAC team in his four seasons of playing college hockey at Colorado College and his five seasons of coaching at Alaska-Fairbanks.
Moving Forward... Princeton closes out 2004 on the road at Massachusetts on Dec. 29. Princeton returns to home ice on Jan. 4 to host American International and resumes ECAC Hockey League play the following weekend when Clarkson and St. Lawrence come to town.
Looking Around the League... The league standings will remain unchanged for the most part through the Jan. 7-8 weekend as there is only one game involving two league teams on the schedule between now and then, that game featuring Vermont and Dartmouth in Hanover. This weekend, several teams are in action in addition to the Tigers. Clarkson hosts Ohio State for two, Union visits Wayne State for two, Dartmouth hosts UMass-Lowell, Harvard hosts Maine and Rensselaer plays host to Boston University.