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Bowling Green State University Athletics
Bowling Green State University
Wayne State
BGSU Gets Seven Goals from Six Different Players for 7-3 Victory
November 19, 2004 | Ice Hockey
Nov. 19, 2004
Plymouth, Mich. - Bowling Green improved a couple of streaks Thursday night against Wayne State, not the least of which was its winning streak, moving it to two games with a 7-3 victory over the Warriors. The Falcons scored four goals in the first period and finished with four power-play goals for the game to improve to 6-2-1.
The Falcons improved to 6-0 when scoring first this season and improved upon its six-goal output on Saturday at Nebraska-Omaha by one goal. Six different Falcons scored goals, including a pair from sophomore Rich Meloche.
"It's a nice run," BGSU Coach Scott Paluch said about the Falcon power play. " I thought we did another nice job on loose pucks to keep the pressure. I think getting the puck to the net is kind of opening the other end of the power play. Us getting there and having Unger, Meloche or Matsumoto in front of the net is giving us an opportunity to get traffic in front of the net."
James Unger got BGSU on the board at 8:30 of the first period with an assist from Ryan Minnabarriet. Freshman Derek Whitmore then tallied his fourth goal of the year, and third PPG, to increase the Falcon lead to 2-0 at 10:59 (Meloche/Michael Hodgson assists). Just under one-and-one half minutes later Meloche scored his first of two goals (PPG) for a 3-0 lead (Whitmore/Ryan Minnabarriet assists).
WSU's Steve Kovalchik cut the lead to 3-1 at 14:26 of the first period before freshman Alex Foster scored the third PPG of the period for BGSU at 19:46 for a 4-1 lead at the first intermission (Hodgson/Minnabarriet assists). BGSU outshot WSU 17-6 in the first period.
Just 3:07 into the second period is when sophomore Jonathan Sigalet scored his first goal of the season for a 5-1 lead (John Mazzei assist). WSU rattled off two unanswered goals later in the second period to cut the lead to 5-3 heading into the third period.
Meloche netted his second goal of the game at 6:28 of the third period (Foster/Hodgson assists) and then Mazzei scored the game's final goal at 9:36 for the 7-3 verdict (Alex Rogosheske/Jeremy Bronson assists).
"I think we're capable of doing that all the time," Meloche said about the success of the power play. "We have a bunch of guys that contribute different nights. I mean Unger had four points the other night."
Hodgson's three assists was his first multiple-point game as a Falcon while Meloche's three points (2g, 1a) were also a career high.
Jordan Sigalet allowed just two even-strength goals and stopped 38 of 41 shots faced. WSU's Will Hooper played the first period (four goals allowed) before Matt Kelly entered and stopped 12 of 15 shots faced over the final two periods. WSU held a 41-32 shot advantage in the game.
The seven goals scored by BGSU were the most since a 9-4 victory over Miami on Nov. 9, 2001. The last time the Falcons scored 13 goals over a two-game span was Jan. 5-6 at Princeton (8-3 and 5-0 victories).
BGSU's four PPGs on Thursday gives them nine extra-man tallies over the last two games and improved their power-play to 27.0 percent (17-of-63) for the season. The Falcons held WSU to 1-for-7 on the power play.
Bronson's assist on the final goal of the game made 21 of the 23 non-goalie Falcons that have tallied either a goal or assist in BGSU's first nine games. BGSU improves to 4-1-1 on the road, matching the total of road wins from all of last season (4-12-4). It also marks the fastest the Falcons have reached six victories since the 1996-97 season when BGSU started 6-0-0.
BGSU hosts Wayne State (6-4-1) on Saturday at the Ice Arena with a special 5:05 p.m. face-off.
