Gale's Hat Trick Leads St. Norbert in Rout of Lake Forest

From Sports Information Director, January 17, 2009 | Men's Hockey
by Dan Lukes, dan.lukes@snc.edu, (920) 403-4077

GREEN BAY - A.J. Gale scored his second hat trick of the month of January to help lead St. Norbert College to a 9-0 win over Lake Forest College in a Northern Collegiate Hockey Association game at Cornerstone Community Center.

St. Norbert, ranked No. 3 in the USCHO.com Division III Poll, improved to 14-4 overall and 5-2 in the NCHA. Lake Forest dropped to 5-12-1, 0-7.

Gale, who has scored nine goals in his last four games, pushed his Division III-leading goals total to 19 with the trio against he Foresters. Gale scored the Green Knights' fifth, seventh and last goals. Gale added an assists for a four-point night.

Steven Sleep registered career highs with four assists and four points. Sleep assisted on Brandon Longley's two goals, as well as a booming slapshot from Taylor Langford. Sleep set up Tyler Allen's third-period goal.

Longley scored the first goal of the game 11:26 into the first period on a breakaway. Matt Boyd gave St. Norbert a 2-0 lead when he knocked in a rebound at 18:20.

St. Norbert put up three goals in the second period, getting scores from Longley, Langford and Gale. The Green Knights scored four times in the third period, with Steven Pratt scoring his first collegiate goal on a pass up the middle from Allen. There was just two whistles in the final 6 minutes 28 seconds of the game.

St. Norbert outshot Lake Forest 44-13. Blake Bashor made 13 saves for his second shutout of the season. Brandon Kohuch made 26 saves in the first two period for Lake Forest, while Scott Campbell made nine saves in the third period.

The game featured just five penalties. The Foresters were 0-for-3 on the power play while the Green Knights were 0-for-2.