Hockey suffers fist loss to CSU
Fans who left the Eccles Ice Arena after the visiting Colorado State Rams took a 5-3 lead in the third period missed a donnybrook after the game between USU’s Josh Groves and CSU’s Jake McFarland.
It all started when, with the final seconds of the first home loss of USU’s season ticking away, McFarland laid a huge blindside hit on freshman defender Paul Reinhard of USU. Reinhard’s body slid and he hit the boards head-first.
Senior forward Groves took exception to the hit, along with the remaining crowd, and offered to settle McFarland’s hash right there. Both benches cleared and all three referees and both coaching staffs got involved trying to prevent an all-out brawl from erupting.
Kent Arsenault, who had just had his first scoreless home game of the season, got involved and was pushing and grabbing with some Rams, shifting the focus of the refs away from McFarland and Groves. But Groves still wanted a piece of McFarland and, with the crowd cheering “Fight! Fight!” both players dropped gloves and headgear and went at it. After a brief exchange of blows, the fight went to the ice and was ended by the refs.
“Their guy threw a cheap shot, there was one second left and their guy threw a hit that was just totally unnecessary and in hockey if you do something like that, a fight will break out. It’s understood that that will happen,” Brett Fryslie said. Fryslie continued to progress in his return from knee surgery and had an assist on a play he created by charging out of the penalty box and attacking the CSU net.
Although he was more active than in his first game back against BYU, Fryslie said he wasn’t where he wants to be. “I didn’t play my best game; I felt I gave up two easy goals. A couple of them I could have stopped, but I messed up,” he said.
After losing the first period 1-0, Robert Hashimoto, who scored off the Fryslie assist, said in the second the Aggies were “really intense.” Unfortunately for USU, Hashi said, “It just seemed like in the third and first periods our intensity dropped.”
Jordan Francom scored two power-play goals in that second period with sick wrist shots as USU built a 3-1 lead.
“Some days you get lucky I guess. On the second one I didn’t even have time to look and the puck just went where I wanted it to go,” Francom said.
Colorado State scored with 7:38 left in the second to cut the home side’s lead to one goal heading into the third. The visitors kept on coming at USU in the third, tying it, taking the lead and finally burying the insurance goal. Greg Finatti made heroic saves all game long, but in the end, couldn’t save the Ags.
“We kind of for some reason have a deal where we go into a shell and get protective rather than aggressive. We’ve got to be really aggressive and keep pressing,” Head Coach Jerry Crossley said.
In the third period USU had a power play on from 7:28 down to 3:44 but couldn’t bury one.
Francom was also involved in a near-fight between himself and Doug Robinson in the second period. He said Robinson “came by and slew-footed out goaltender and that was about the fourth time he was up on our goalie, or someone was, so I just freaked out. The number one rule in hockey is that you don’t let guys touch your goaltender.”
The fallout from the big fight for USU will be playing without Arsenault and Groves on Thursday in the Ec against San Jose State. CSU’s McFarland was also disqualified, but considering it was his over-the-line play that was the spark in the powder keg, the visitors were fortunate to only have one skater DQed.
It was on CSU’s home ice back on Oct. 7 that the Ags took a 6-5 comeback decision from the Rams that seemed to boost their confidence and sent them on a hot streak in which they dismantled five teams in a row. In that span, they set a new scoring record in a 20-0 win and at least one player had a hat trick in every game.
Aaron Schimmel did not play.
-graham@cc.usu.edu