A weekend of blowouts for Utah State hockey
The No. 1-ranked University of Colorado Buffaloes unleashed a five-goal deluge on the Aggies in the first period that resulted in Greg Finatti being pulled from the USU goal in favor of Dan Cornelius, and the Ags lost at home, 7-2.
Matt Geer scored off of assists from Kent Arsenault and Maciej Michalik to make it 2-1 midway through the first, but a close game was not in the cards. The Buffs kept working Finatti over, as five different CU skaters scored in the first period. Colorado did it on the power play and even-handed. They scored goals with two assists, and they scored unassisted.
PJ Bevan scored on the power play for Colorado in the second, the lone goal of that period. Ryan Osterheldt scored a power play goal for USU early in the third to make the score slightly more respectable, but then David Ludwig got to Cornelius on a power play goal to provide the final margin of victory.
With 3:11 to go in the game, a fight broke out in which USU’s Mike “Bishop” Walker took out a little frustration on Colorado’s Mark View.
“We were losing real bad. I was sitting on the bench for a little bit, so I asked the kid if he wanted to go,” Walker said. “He said stupid remarks to me, so I just dropped my gloves. He just said, ‘Go score some goals’ or something stupid.”
Walker used his right hand to do some damage to View and came away unscathed.
“It was just a normal fight, but I didn’t get hit at all, so it came out good,” he said.
Another big loss
After Arsenault scored the game’s opening goal, Colorado State University took control with an assist from referee Matt Brickley and poured in 11 straight goals. The national anthem, belted out with great verve and élan by an alto known only as “Junior,” was the high point of the evening for Aggie fans.
The Rams capitalized on two power-play opportunities to put USU in a hole midway through the first period and kept pouring it on, resulting in Cornelius getting pulled in favor of Finatti when the score was 6-1. Finatti fared no better, allowing five goals in one and a half periods.
Brickley blew five calls in the first period alone, while sending a steady stream of Aggies to the box. Three straight USU penalties to open the game was bad enough, but then Brickley got Aaron Shimmel on a call which resulted in a back-breaking five minute power play for the visitors. USU was only down 3-1 entering the second period, but CSU punched in two more power-play goals in the first two minutes of the second to put the Ags away for all intents.
“He definitely came out and ruined the game again. We didn’t put out our best effort in, but at the same time you can’t win a hockey game when the ref’s against you every time,” Arsenault said. “He has something against us. I don’t know what it is, but every time he comes, he does this. I don’t know if he wants the attention from the crowd or what he wants, but he ruins it every time. That’s all I have to say about it.”
The final penalty tally was 22 against USU and 15 against CSU, but that’s only half the story. Among USU’s penalties were three ejections, three 10-minuters and two five-minuters. Eight of the 11 CSU goals were scored on the power play.
With nine minutes to go in the second, the Ags were on a rare power play when they turned the biscuit over in the area of the high slot and CSU’s Dane Cella pounced, burying a wrist shot.
USU couldn’t buy a call from Brickley even when Kyler McCarrel was blatantly tripped on a face-off. As the USU coaches jumped up and down on their bench, Brickley skated around and decided not to call anything.
USU’s Scotty John said, “The team wants to apologize to the fans for tonight and this weekend in general. We hope everyone keeps coming out. Next weekend’s going to be a different story. Thanks for your support.”
As recently as Jan. 25, the USU hockey outlook was much rosier. USU was coming off a close overtime loss to No. 2 Eastern Washington and ripped up Montana, 8-1. Then Eastern Washington proved they deserve their lofty ranking, drilling USU badly at home. Then came this weekend’s debacle, and the Aggies find themselves riding a three-game losing streak into next weekend’s home clashes against in-state rivals Brigham Young University and Utah Valley State College.
-graham.terry@aggiemail.usu.edu