The Quinnipiac men’s hockey team began their home side of ECAC play with a 5-1 drubbing of the Brown Bears Friday night.
The Bobcats came back to the M&T Bank Arena after a road trip out east to play Dartmouth and Harvard ended in one win and one tie.
Friday night’s game saw the return of alternate captain Collin Graf for the Bobcats, who endured an almost three-week absence due to injury. With his return, Graf came back in style, tallying one goal and two assists for three total points on the night.
“It just gives a lift,” said head coach Rand Pecknold. “Everybody plays better when Graf’s around, (the) powerplay is better for sure…he’s one of the best players in the country and we are happy to have him back.”
Speaking of the powerplay, the Bobcats went 2-2 on the man-advantage, with Graf as well as junior forward Jacob Quillan getting goals.
“Well we just get the puck to Collin,” Pecknold said. “He’s just really good, he just calms everything down. You need that quarterback, whether it’s on top, or on a flank, and every great team has one, he’s our guy, and when he’s not there, we are still putting five good players on the ice, but we just put on that guy to take over for us…we need him for sure as he’s shown in the few games he’s played in, he’s been really good.”
Graf’s absence from the team was something of a sore subject for him, as his recovery process was certainly something that he wasn’t expecting.
“It was longer than I wanted,” Graf, a junior forward, said. “Just sort of bad luck at UNH and something that I’ve never really had to deal with before. Missing games like that…mentally it took a lot to get back and watch the boys play without me, but I’m happy to be back now.”
12 minutes into the first period, Quillan got on the board with his fourth of the year on the powerplay. No less than a minute later, Brown would respond when sophomore Ryan St. Louis would tie the game at one.
In the second, Jacob Quillan would score his second of the night 39 seconds into the period. Four minutes later, the Bobcats would put more points on the board when sophomore Sam Lipkin scored his first goal of the night, and fifth of the season. The next 15 minutes warranted chance after chance for the Bobcats, but the Brown defense held firm behind a great performance by sophomore goaltender Tyler Shea, to keep the score at 3-1.
In the third, the Bobcats would have a milestone, as sophomore Alex Power collected his first NCAA goal and point with a goal 4:17 into the period..
“Yeah it was awesome,” Pecknold said. “Tough year for Alex last year as we were really good, and I think he played one game, and it was hard, as he was a really good hockey player, and he stuck with it, and he came in this year, and he’s battled to get himself in the line-up…and he has to continue to buy in and he’ll have a lot of success for us.”
“Such a great feeling,” Power said. “Been looking forward to it for a while now. For it to finally happen, it really felt good, I was really excited.”
Behind Power’s goal, the Bobcats would extend their lead to 4-1, and with just 2:40 left in the game, Graf would get his goal, increasing the Bobcats lead to 5-1, where it would stay until the game’s end.
Quinnipiac now sits at 6-3-1(2-0-1 in ECAC play), and they look ahead to Saturday’s match-up, which is against rival Yale in the battle of Whitney Avenue, and a chance to hoist the Heroes Hat at 7 p.m. at M&T Bank Arena.
