Seniors Steal the Show, Bobcats Win

HAMDEN – Friday night was Senior Night at TD Bank Sports Center as the Quinnipiac Bobcats took on the Brown Bears in an ECAC Conference match-up. It was the seniors who led the way for the Bobcats as they totaled 9 points on the evening, in an 8-3 win.

The scoring was kicked off at 2:38 into the first period when a cross-ice outlet pass was made to Eric Lampe who broke the puck down the right wing and took a shot on goal. The rebound was knocked around before the puck found senior captain Jean-Marc Beaudoin’s stick in front of the net allowing him to put the puck past the Brown goaltender Michael Clemente.

A Bobcat interference penalty on Zach Hansen almost midway through the first was where Brown was able to score its lone goal of the period. A Jarred Smith pass from the half board’s to the slot was re-directed in by Brown forward David Brownschidle, making the score 1-1.

The Bobcats(16-15-2, 10-11-0) added another in the period when Mike Dalhuisen made a pass from his own goal line to Mike Atkinson on the fly, breaking through the neutral zone. Atkinson continued on, past the defenseman, and drove to the goal where he got a shot off, and another Clemente rebound was left sitting in the crease for Jeremy Langlois to score his sixth goal of the season with 4:39 left in the period to give the Bobcats a 2-1 lead.

QU Seniors (L-R): Greg Holt, Mike Atkinson, Brandon Wong, Jean-Marc Beaudoin, Eric Lampe, & Sami Liimatainen

Langlois said, “all the underclass men took it upon us to not be our fault and make sure that we needed to do all the little things we needed to do.” The freshman, Langlois, had two goals on Senior Night.

Quinnipiac used a lot of ice to score its first two goals. Bobcat Head Coach Rand Pecknold noted: “Brown was trapping and we found the seam. They did not trap much tonight, like they did they last time we played them.”

The 2-1 lead the Bobcats had to start the period grew as QU had a four-goal effort in the second period. The first came just :38 seconds into the period when Brandon Wong tapped in the wide-open backdoor goal on a pass from Lampe. The Bobcats added two more goals just 21-seconds apart, starting with 15:04 left in the period. Greg Holt finished the scoring for the Bobcats on a seeing-eye blast from the point which found the back of the net, for the third Bobcat power-play goal of the period.

The Bobcats were able to lead for remaining time in the period. A power-play goal from the Bear’s Francis Drolet was its only answer to Quinnipiac’s four goals. Brown (6-12-4, 8-17-4) continued to bring the pressure for the rest of the period but Bobcats goalie Dan Clarke was up to the task. Clarke made a big glove save on a breakaway attempt from Brown toward the end of the period. Clarke stopped 27 of 30 shots in the game.

Quinnipiac led 6-2 through two periods. The scoring rampage continued in the third period with three more goals between the two teams. The Bobcats added another two goals on a Langlois back-hander for his second goal of the tilt, and the man who started the game’s scoring, Beaudoin, put home another power-play goal on the doorstep to finish off the scoring. Brown added one more goal to make the final score 8-3.

The second half of the game became very chippy as Brown found itself down by a lot and playing the antagonizing role to try and lure the Bobcats to the penalty box. Both teams had a combined 70 minutes in penalties.

One of the game’s three-stars, Beaudoin, talked about trying to avoid the rough play, “we showed a lot of focus there and showed some composure to stay away from it.”

Beaudoin was tied with his two teammates, Atkinson and Lorren Baron, with a game-high three points. The two goals on the game also gave Beaudoin his seventh multi-point game of the year.

The win has the Bobcats will wrap-up the season Saturday night, at TD Bank against rival No. 5. Yale at 7:30