There was much to celebrate at M&T Bank Arena on Saturday night as the Quinnipiac University men’s hockey team played its final home game of the regular season with a 5-2 victory over Brown. With the win the Bobcats went unbeaten at home in the regular season, and picked up their eighth straight win.

“I think you want to take care of your home ice no matter what,” Quinnipiac assistant coach Mike Corbett said after the game. “We won the games that we needed to win.”

Following Friday night’s win over Yale, the Bobcats not only won the Heroes’ Hat but clinched the Cleary Cup, which is given to the team with the best regular season record in the ECAC. The Bobcats were presented with the Cup following Saturday’s game when it was handed to captain Zach Metsa. It is the third straight year Quinnipiac has held the honor. 

“Everybody has to understand that champions are hard to win,” Corbett said. “Any championship you have the ability to win for your program is something special.”

If emotions were not high enough already for tonight’s game, the final home game of the regular season marks senior day each year. The team celebrated four graduating seniors and two graduate students after the game.

“I think they were great,” Quinnipiac sophomore Collin Graf said about the senior leadership. “They’d be reaching out before the season in the spring, I got texts from guys just welcoming me to the team.”

Amongst all these emotions the Bobcats still had a game to play against a Brown team that they only narrowly beat 4-3 in Providence earlier this season on Nov. 11.

The Bobcats were able to turn emotion into high energy, skating fast in the opening minute and generating early shots from Victor Czerneckianair and Michael Lombardi. 

With just over three minutes gone in the game, Lombardi took a shot from the right side of Brown’s goaltender Jacob Zacharewicz. Zacharewicz gave up a rebound which fell all the way to the opposite side of the ice. Metsa found the puck and shot it, this time beating Zacharewicz.

The Bears eventually found their legs, and James Crossman went five hole on Yaniv Perets to even the game at one. Despite the Bobcats dominating possession, the game was tied.

Within five minutes the Bobcats got their lead back, this time the goal scorer being Sam Lipkin. When Quinnipiac sophomore Graf sent the puck across the goal mouth, Zacharewicz couldn’t react in time, leaving a tap in for Lipkin.

“I think the winning culture here is second to none,” said Graf. “At the end of the day the Cleary is not our goal, we got more things to focus on, we got the Whitelaw, we got the Frozen Four, that’s what we’re looking for at the end of the year this year.”

Quinnipiac’s continued offensive pressure forced Jordan Tonelli to commit a hooking penalty in his defensive zone. The Bobcats applied pressure on the Bears in the game’s opening power play, which included a shot from the blue line from Metsa, but ultimately they failed to double their lead.

Brown had a chance to tie the game early in the second period when CJ McGee went to the penalty box for hooking, but it would be the Bobcats who scored during McGee’s penalty. Ethan de Jong scored a short handed goal when he went high blocker side on Zacharewicz after Skylar Brind’Amour carried it all the way through the neutral zone and into the Brown defensive zone, before dropping it off to de Jong.

The Bobcats continued their eye for the net when Metsa, Graf and de Jong all connected on a passing play which led to Brind’Amour scoring right in front of the net. However, the Bobcat scoring in the second period wasn’t done yet.

“Brown is more man on man, so it’s just making that little adjustment offensively,” forward Jacob Quillian said. “They like pinching down the wall so part of the plan was to transition pretty quick.” 

Quinnipiac certainly made the right adjustments offensively, including when Lipkin scored his second goal of the game with 14.8 seconds left in the period. Lipkin went high on Zacharewicz’s glove side from the left face off dot to give Quinnipiac a 5-1 lead. Brown failed to generate a shot on goal in the entire second period.

Quinnipiac made a change in goal to start the third period, taking off Perets and giving Chase Clark playing time for the second time in just as many nights.

“I think Rand just wanted to give Chase Clark a look, he did a pretty good job there,” Quillan said when talking about his teammate. “Hopefully he will get more opportunities to prove himself.”

Jake Johnson committed a tripping penalty just 24 seconds into the third period, and the Bears capitalized by scoring just 27 seconds later when James Crossman beat Clark, who was on the ice for less than a minute, to get his second goal of the game. 

The Bobcats and Clark were able to see off any remaining attacks by the Bears to win 5-2. Quinnipiac has now beat Brown for five straight meetings, dating back to Feb. 28, 2020.

Quinnipiac will close out its Cleary Cup winning regular season next weekend when the Bobcats travel to Union and RPI. They will then return to M&T Bank Arena for the ECAC playoff quarterfinals on March 10.