The silver lining to last weekend is that it’s over.
The Saint Louis University hockey club dropped a pair of uninspired games to the University of Arizona on Friday and Saturday night.
After a disappointing showing Friday night, which ended in a 10-6 loss, the Billikens had a chance to rebound Saturday, but Arizona came out feisty and maintained relentless intensity throughout the entire game.
Arizona scored their first goal 4:11 into the first period when Arizona players crowded around the net and the puck skirted in past an unexpecting Geoff Schuessler. A minute and a half later, Arizona blasted a shot in on a two-on-one breakaway.
Halfway through the period, the Billikens finally finished a chance in front of the net when Greg McLennan broke free from the Arizona defensemen and carried the puck to Arizona’s net and made a short cross to Adam Kulp, who buried the goal to narrow Arizona’s lead to 2-1.
The tag-teamed goal was not enough to unhinge Arizona’s defense and the Bills went into the intermission down 5-2.
“Getting on the board first would have been huge,” said coach John Bosch. “Five goals in the first period is unexcusable.”
After a scrappy first period, the Billikens tried to narrow the gap in the second period and showed greater physical effort against the abusive Arizona squad, but the Bills were unable to mount a significant rally.
Arizona quickly scored two more goals to pad their lead, but Tim Niedbalski answered back with a goal despite the Bills being shorthanded.
With Arizona pulling further away from the Bills, SLU still managed to score two more goals before the end of the third period. Jordan James took advantage of a lapse in goaltending by Arizona when he snuck the puck in while the goaltender was away from the goal retrieving his glove. Peter Arndt scored the final goal of the period for the Billikens.
“After the first period, we needed to try to get more physical,” Bosch said. “We decided to try to play more physical in front of the net, and I think that helped turn things around.”
Following the trend of the previous two periods, Arizona scored first in the third period, but SLU would not let Arizona go quietly in the final stanza.
Halfway through the period, Mike Reid scored an uncontested goal off a hard slapshot in front of the net in an attempt to chip away at Arizona’s staggering lead. In the final SLU run, Niedbalski capitalized on a screen in front of the goaltender and blasted a hard shot nearly from the blue line into the net. Despite the late scoring efforts, Arizona skated past SLU 12-7.
This weekend, the team will face off against the University of Rhode Island in Providence before returning home for the final home series on Feb. 7 and Feb. 8 against Iowa State University.
