The puck stops short for USU in Las Vegas

The free-fall continued last weekend for the Utah State hockey club as it lost two games to UNLV and another one to BYU at a tournament in Las Vegas.

Thursday, the Aggies lost to the Rebels 2-1. Friday, they lost to the Icecats 6-3 and Saturday, USU lost to UNLV again in a 2-0 shutout.

“This weekend was just weird,” Aggie Roberto Leo said. “Things just didn’t work out. No one stepped up and led.”

Leo said nothing went right for USU.

“It was bad,” he said. “Nobody could put the puck in the net. We were not playing as a team.”

It was the first-ever meeting between USU and UNLV. The Rebels are currently unranked in the region.

“Those losses to UNLV will hurt,” Leo said.

The Aggies were playing without three of their players. Defenseman Brett Bryslie did not play any games due to an injury he suffered two weeks ago against Eastern Washington. Ryan Osterheldt was still suspended from an on-ice incident against UVSC on Nov. 5. And Jordan Francom received a misconduct penalty in the first game and had to sit out.

The losses were the third, fourth and fifth in a row for USU after winning three in a row against UVSC, No. 2 Denver and Washington. The Aggies have not played at home since their Nov. 11 game against Denver.

“That could have had something to do with [the bad weekend],” Leo said. “But even on the road, we have to win.”

USU will finally play in the state again on Friday and Saturday against the Weber State Division-II team.

“We knew this would be a big weekend for us,” Leo said. “We already lost once to them.”

Leo said USU still has potential to be a very good team, but it needs to find its rhythm again.

“We just need to forget about it, come out and play hockey,” he said. “We’ve got to get down to fundamentals.”

Leo said the team can’t assume anything at this point.

“We just need to take it one game at a time,” he said. “We need to concentrate on what we need to do to get to regionals and nationals. We need to win some games.”

-bhhinton@cc.usu.edu