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Bowling Green State University Athletics
Bowling Green State University
Ohio State
Falcons Clinch Playoff Spot With Win Over Buckeyes
February 26, 2000 | Ice Hockey
Feb. 26, 2000
Bowling Green, OH - The Bowling Green State University hockey secured a spot in the 2000 Central Collegiate Hockey Association tournament with a 7-1 victory over Ohio State in front of 4,061 at the BGSU Ice Arena on Saturday, Feb. 26.
The win moves the Falcons into an eighth place tie with Miami at 23 points. The RedHawks enter the final week of the regular season with a league mark of 10-13-3, while BG will take an 11-14-1 record into its home-and-home series with Michigan. Miami plays at Ohio State on Tuesday (Feb. 29), and completes the regular season with a home game against OSU on Saturday, March 4. The CCHA's first tiebreaker is league wins (BG currently leads 11-10), while the second tiebreaker is head-to-head record (2-2-0) with the third tiebreaker being goals for versus goals against in the head-to-head series (Miami wins 14-12).
BG's Greg Day scored the only goal of the first period with 4:27 remaining. Day's 12th of the campaign was assisted by Austin de Luis and Tyler Knight. After taking a feed from Knight, de Luis "nutmegged" an OSU defenseman and sent a pass to Day, who twirled around and beat Buckeye goalie Ray Aho.
Junior Ryan Murphy scored the game-winning goal 0:56 into the middle stanza when he knocked in his own rebound. Scott Hewson and B.J. Adams assisted on Murphy's eighth of the season. OSU's Eric Meloche scored his 18th of the season, and 13th power-play goal, at the 9:07 mark from just outside the crease.
The Falcons went ahead again by two goals when Ryan Fultz scored his first of the game at the 14:22 mark during a BG power play. Grady Moore's blueline blast bounced in off of Fultz. Michael Jones had the second assist on Fultz's 13th of the year. Adam Edinger completed the second period scoring with an unassisted goal with 2:11 remaining in the period. Edinger broke in and went top shelf with a backhand shot over Aho's glove.
Fultz started the third period scoring with a five-on-five goal at the 6:03 mark. His team-leading 14th goal of the year was assisted by Ryan Murphy and Adam Edinger. Ryan Wetterberg scored his first collegiate short-handed goal with 5:09 remaining in the contest off an assist from Louis Mass.
Fultz then completed BG's first hat trick in more than a year (Dan Price scored all three Falcon goals in a 4-3 overtime loss at Alaska Fairbanks on Feb. 12, 1999), when Greg Day and Marc Barlow assisted during a four-on-three Falcon power play with 1:02 left in the contest.
BG freshman goalie Tyler Masters made 19 saves, while Aho turned aside 23 of BG's 30 shots.
Bowling Green scored on two of its six power-play chances, while Ohio State managed one man-advantage marker in its seven opportunities.
The Falcons improved to 14-17-1 overall (11-14-1 in the CCHA), while OSU falls to 11-19-4 overall and 7-16-3 in the CCHA.
BG will entertain Michigan on Friday, Mar. 3 in the regular-season home finale. Face-off at the BGSU Ice Arena is slated for 7:35 p.m. The Falcons will conclude the regular-season on Saturday, Mar. 4 at Michigan's Yost Ice Arena. Face-off in Ann Arbor is 7:05 p.m.
