By Patrick Thompson
The UK hockey team remains undefeated after two convincing wins over Akron University this weekend.
Following Friday night’s 7-5 win, UK again took to the ice Saturday firing on all cylinders in a largely one-sided match.
The Cool Cats played physically in the first period, crashing the net for rebound opportunities and beating their opponents to the loose pucks. They kept the puck in the offensive zone for most of the period, cycling the puck to find the open man in the slot.
The strong offense resulted in four goals being scored by freshman forward Charlie Hales, sophomores Jeremy Schmidt and Jake Boss, and senior captain Billy Glass.
“We were able to break out of the zone well and create odd man rushes and two-on-one opportunities, and I think that helped us a lot”, said Glass.
Akron was outmatched for most of the game, struggling to break out of their defensive zone, and turning the puck over in neutral ice. However, they were able to catch a break in the second period with a shorthanded goal off a UK turnover in front of the net.
UK’s offense stayed strong as Boss answered with his second goal of the game with 28 seconds left in the second period, giving the Cats a 5-1 lead going into the break.
Penalties were a factor that allowed Akron to stay in the game, as UK had to play shorthanded for much of the game. UK committed 19 penalties on Friday and 10 more on Saturday.
“Penalties will kill us,” Glass said, “We had a couple of three-on-fives and we were able to kill them off, but against a top 10 team we won’t be able to kill them like we did against Akron.”
Though UK was on the penalty kill for much of the weekend, junior goalie Matt Bougie kept them in the game by making some key saves in both matches.
Bougie, making his first start of the season on Friday, said, “I felt pretty comfortable out there. I took a year off to focus on academics last year, but it felt good to get out there and play again.”
Akron tacked on two more goals late in the third period, but it wasn’t enough to hinder UK’s offense as the Cats added two more of their own from sophomore forward Chris Salomone and senior forward Sean Wittman. Wittman’s goal came with 2:46 left in the third period, and closed the game with a convincing 7-3 victory.
The Cool Cats will play next weekend in the ACHA Showcase in St. Louis, MO, where they will face off against Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Florida Gulf Coast and the University of Texas.
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