Ag hockey welcomes Oregon, ASU to Ice Center
The Thanksgiving Break has never looked so good for the Utah State hockey club.
Assistant coach Ty Newberry has frequently said how, with the travel the Aggies have had to deal with (to Arizona and California in a bus 15 hours both ways), every game has had the feel of a must-win game because of the lack of a good day off.
“This is the first time since I’ve coached college hockey that I’ve actually looked forward to a week off at Thanksgiving,” Newberry said. “Usually we just look at it and say, ‘Oh man, the guys are gonna go home and eat turkey, they’re gonna get fat, they’re gonna come back and their timing [will be] screwed up.’ But it’s a level playing field.”
USU’s break will come after this weekend’s home games in which the Aggies will host the University of Oregon and Arizona State University (a Division I club team) on Friday and Saturday at the Eccles Ice Center. Both games are scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m.
Following Saturday’s game, the Aggies won’t be in action again until Dec. 6 – a home game against Weber State.
USU is currently 5-8-1, and will seek to raise its No. 5 ranking in the Nov. 15 American Collegiate Hockey Association (ACHA) poll.
The Aggies, a Division II team, faced the Sun Devils Nov. 1, losing 6-5. In that contest, Newberry said USU was down 6-0, but thanks to an ASU player receiving a five-minute major the Aggies were able to fight back.
Newberry was quick to point out the Aggies only scored two goals in those five minutes and everything else was earned in five-on-five situations.
“We can beat them,” said USU center Jacob Guttormsen. “[In the last meeting] we did our normal Utah State hockey thing where we’re down going into the third period and we step up and come back. Hopefully we can play a confident three periods of hockey to the best of our ability, which we have yet to do this season.”
The situation the Sun Devils are in – traveling to play teams who aren’t in their division – makes it difficult for them and the Aggies, Guttormsen said.
“It’s one of those things,” he said. “When you play D1 teams you never know what you’re gonna get because they have absolutely nothing to gain from it. We have to bring a very disciplined, and tense, emotional game to be competitive.”
Oregon and USU will be meeting for the first and only time this season. The Fighting Ducks are 5-5 on the season, according to their web site.
Looking for consistency in the lines
The starting lineup for USU hasn’t exactly been set in stone this season.
The lines have been constantly changed because of players on the team committing untimely penalties.
Sometimes as many as six or seven guys have been benched at a time.
“Right now everybody is playing everywhere,” Newberry said. “[Those] taking selfish penalties [have] earned them a spot on the bench for a while to think about what they have done.
“Our lines have not stayed consistent, [but] we’ve shown that when we do shuffle things up in the middle of a game the guys react in the same way without relying on certain
people to carry them,” he said.
Editor’s note: USU defeated the University of Idaho 10-3 on Thursday night at the Ice Center
-samhis@cc.usu.edu